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Every year I somehow forget how good Thomas Vanek is until he scores shrifty-five goals against the Bruins. Welp.
Good things about that game:
- Brad Marchand's goal. Lord have mercy, what a thing of beauty. Love it when he proves that he's not just a nose and a mouth on skates.
- Patrice Bergeron didn't get seriously hurt.
- Um....the P-Bruins won tonight. That's good, right?
Terrible things about that game:
- First regulation loss. Blah.
- "Our guys, defensively, were just totally out of it....defensively, I guess you could say braindead." Yeah, you're fucking right they were, Claude.
- Power play is 3 for 28. I don't get it. At what point do they actually make an effort to fix this, or is it just something they allow to flounder in favor of the rest of their game being great? How long do we have to gnash our teeth about this before Geoff Ward gets the boot?
- Dear Zdeno Chara: why did you do most of the things you did tonight? Chara and Boychuk were a disaster on the ice in this game. Twice they were beaten down the ice (thanks, Vanek) , Boychuk was horrendously out of position at least three times that I saw, and leaving Vanek alone with Rask is just cruel.
- In all seriousness, Kind of worried about Dougie Hamilton's head after that elbow by Drew Stafford. After seeing guys like David Perron come back and finish a game after a headshot by Joe Thornton - and then sit out a full year because of a concussion - it's always a worry to see. Hoping Shanahan takes a look at it, at least.
- Shawn Thornton is hurt. Hopefully not too seriously.
- Lindy Ruff is a jackwagon. Really, a timeout when you're up 7-4 with 12 seconds to go? Go home Lindy Ruff.
Sort of neutral things about that game:
- Hahaha, the Sabres are more effective without Patrick Kaleta. Who'da thunk it?
- John Scott the skating pylon played a whopping 4:28 tonight and took 7 minutes of PIMs. I wonder how long it will take for him to have more PIMs than TOI this season?
- Steve Ott was relatively invisible out there tonight, which was nice I guess.
- Mikael Grigorenko looks GOOD. So does Tyler Ennis, and obviously Vanek. Maybe the Sabres should actually focus on skill guys..............NAHHH.
Will find Corsi charts later. Stay tuned.