travel_dude

Poor Sergeev. Has a game where he let in a couple of goals. Killed his stats. LOL I really hope they start using Vladar a bit more. The defense is really tight when he is out there. He's cool under pressure. Hard to believe he only has that one loss against Trawna. Was a shutout until a poor clearing attempt set up the tying goal.

Good perspective. They had Ruzicka taking the majority of the draw for the 4th line, and he won 5 of 7. I know he's not a mucker as such, but Sutter loves to win draws. It was a strange mix with Ruzicka either playing LW or C and Dube playing LW or RW. I was never sure who was where. If he stays until we play at home, Sutter may be able to use him better. TBH, I thought Richardson was a little better, but he's getting killed out there with Dube. The experience is great, but maybe we need a slightly different type of player.

Pionk was bad, sticking out his knee when he missed the check. Spezza was insane. Than's like a MMA move. Target a players head with your knee. It should be 10.

I don't think it's overly a cause for concern. They were a little flat at times. I pointed out some obvious things, but it was more or less just a lack of pace. Sutter wasn't too concerned. Neither am I.

On another NHL note: Philly fires everyone including AV. Nucks fire Benning and Green. Wonder if the Yotes are next, or do they want to stay in the basement.

A diplomatic boycott is not the same as the country boycotting, The USA one is just the diplomats that get a free trip and do glad handing etc. when there. The athletes are not being barred. We would be the same, should we decide to boycott. They may leave it up to the individual players (NHL for instance), but we can easily get enough that want to go. Lehner is not going because he says his mental health is not good.

The 4th line was a mess. I can think of at least one pass that went off his skates, while he was streaking up the right side. He's a C, not a RW or LW. It's best to use a top 6 type player in at least the middle 6. 4th line with Richardson wasn't a great idea. It seems Ruzi was used for his faceoffs, so I don't even know if he was C or just took draws.

Why is it we tend to suffer with bad ice, yet the home team is able to get stuff going? This isn't the first case of crap ice. And it's probably game #2 where we struggled in the N zone. First one being Dallas.

I saw a few really good plays by him, but the line as a whole was getting owned. If he's a better C than LW, then give him a LW and RW that can compete. Lucic-Ruzicka-Dube might be alright, but then we have no LW for Backlund. About one winger short. Pitlick is injured. I think BT is looking at the next F from Stockton. Would Pelletier-Ruzicka-Dube really be any worse than what we have seen? Or even Dube (RW) with Backlund and Lucic-Ruzicka-Pelletier?

He took a step backwards last year, so he needs to get back that game that made him look like a good prospect.

Some words about faceoff: Ruzicka won 5/7 Backlund won 12 of 18 Monahan won 4 of 14 Richardson won 1 of 1 Lindholm won 14 of 25. Easy to see that Ruzicka can win draws. He plays primarily on C. Not sure what Richardson did last night, but overall the line was brutal. When you are on the road, you lose the matchup battle when your 4th line isn't able to stay above water.

Sutter's comments are telling. He was not concerned about the effort, except in the individual battles and pace. I will agree on some things I saw. Pace - not generating speed through the N zone, too long at breaking out. Battles - lost too many individual ones. Giving up 2 on 1's is a function of battles. You lose position, then you are chasing the puck. Lose a board battle and spend shift defending.

It's on of those games where a few mistakes cost us the game. Not that we played well enough to win, but the goalie gave us the chance. Two goals were from poor line changes, odd man rushes. The one goal in the 2nd combined with the penalty calls allowed VGK to get momentum. I'm not going to give any excuses here. Tired or not, you need to play the same game as you do against Ottawa. Very little pressure to them on their zone exits.

Really hard to say what EDM is this year. We lost in our season opener in their barn. They are not a dominant team at any stretch. They win games by hiding the problems behind a couple of players. This game was less about Vegas playing well than it was us playing poorly. Haven't seen us play such a poor game in quite a long time. We play like this we aren't even beating the Nucks. We play Vegas two more time, both in CGY. That's it.

I would hardly call this playoff hockey, unless you count the iffy calls. The penalties didn;t really impact the score, but it shifted the play to defending for too much. I suppose Tkachuk should really quit that little pop with the glove on. Needless play. They missed the rest of the action which was more questionable.

A post by Tkachuk and a missed open net by Ras (a post as well). Sometimes they come back to haunt you.

They didn't deserve a win or a point. Take the lumps and move on to SJ. Can;t lose there, would ruin the run we had going.

So close

Put Marky back in for the faceoff.

Mangiapane, the Road Warrior

Okay, I take that back. Please don't pu;; again untill you have good control

Down by 2, goalie pulled. What could go wrong.

How Andersson didn't bury that. Oh, my It's why you don;t do a fly by.

Guess the takedown by Vegas didn;t register as anything wrong.

Typical, we get the call. Sutter needs to rip the ref a new one.