At long last we find ourselves back in the warm glow of televised hockey, and it seems the US government declared it a national holiday or something! Excellent! To celebrate the day we tried our hands at a little traditional mixology and imbibed Americanos this afternoon; it was a purely coincidental choice of beverage, but we’ll pretend we meant it as a sign of our lack of support for Ottawa.
During VS’s pregame show our preference for the Ducks in this series is further cemented thanks to a shot of the Niedermayers arriving at the arena… in a Prius. As long-time Prius drivers (and proselytizers), we are so thrilled by this that we have officially forgiven Nieder for leaving the Devils for the Ducks (but we won’t back down on our resentment of Baby Nieder for being the reason he left in the first place). So the ball’s in the Senators’ court now: if you want us to like you at all, Sens, you boys are going to have to start producing some tree-hugging Prius owners, and maybe ditch a particular Hummer driver we can think of.
The Pregame show further cracks us up with “interviews” cobbled together from clips of notable players doing sit-down soundbites, and then clips of Bob Harwood and Chris Simpson “asking” questions to frame the soundbites. It’s as ridiculous as the “Better Know A District” interviews on The Colbert Report. The feature with Daniel Alfredsson concludes with Bill Clement saying, “There isn’t anyone who isn’t cheering for Daniel Alfredsson”, to which Boomer retorts, “There are three who aren’t cheering for him right here, Bill.”
FIRST PERIOD
Our broadcast pair is Doc and Eddie Olczyk, and they lead off with Eddie telling us he thinks this game is going to feature fast-paced, hard-hitting, exciting hockey, which would be a real departure from everything we’ve seen so far in this postseason.
We are shocked and appalled that VS has made no mention yet of the most important question facing the hockey world today: is Baby Crunchy skating tonight? And where’s Drew Miller’s stilted reading of the “NHL on VS: Do or die” cue cards?
Before the anthems Chris Simpson (wearing a top with a v-neck that plunges to her navel; she really brings out the prudes in us) interviews Pronger and asks, “Most players spend their entire careers trying to get to the Finals once. What’s it like to get there twice?” We hope Nieder is skating around just off-camera saying, “Wow, Prongsie, you should be really proud of yourself, just getting to the Finals twice. What an accomplishment. Now I’m going to go gaze contentedly at my three rings.”
We want to go on record saying we think “O Canada” is the second-best national anthem in the world, observing them, of course, outside the context of our actual citizenship (Italy is our favorite, Russia is our third-favorite, and “Advance Australia Fair” is fourth. For those of you keeping score at home). Tonight the Canadian anthem is sung by a random person, and the American anthem gets “superstar” treatment from Stills from Crosby, Stills and Nash. We originally scoff that Canada got totally dissed there, but Stills is so awful we actually think Canada ended up getting the better end of the bargain.
And there’s a ceremonial puck drop (Come ON, NHL. We’re ready for some hockey already!) with Arnold Schwarzenegger, who Pookie hopes walks up to Emery and says, “You’re killing the Earth with your car.” You know. From one Hummer driver to another.
19:37 We are shocked to discover, as action finally commences, how much we really want the Senators to lose. We didn’t think it was possible for us to care this much.
19:07 The robust crowd kind of listlessly boos as the expected Duck parade to the box is started by Nieder, who deploys his signature move — hitting a guy over the head with his stick — against Neil in retaliation for Neil running him.
18:28 That’s Sean O’Donnell for you. He whiffs completely on a puck that bounces high off Giggy’s shoulder, then is stuck standing there like an asshole watching Comrie tap the puck into the wide-open net. Eddie exclaims, “What a heads-up play by Mike Comrie!” Pookie: “Fuck Mike Comrie.” Isn’t this fun? (The goal later seems to be credited to Fisher. Whatever.)
17:26 Heatley trips Nieder as the Ducks make their way out of their zone. We are not enamored of the way the Senators have come out hitting, and fully expect a short-handed goal here.
16:31 To set up on the PP the Ducks actually dump the puck in… and chase it. We imagine the Senators are panicking, “Oh my God! They dump and chase! We’ve never seen anyone do that before!!”
13:57 During the commercial break we realize why the Ducks aren’t winning: Baby Crunchy doesn’t seem to be playing. We really wouldn’t mind if, at the top of the game, VS would give us a lineup. Every other sport does it. It shouldn’t be that hard.
12:53 Joe Corvo gets flattened on the boards. We should probably like him because we just found out he went to the same high school as our dad. At different times, of course, but still. It’s fair to say, though, that the Fenwick Factor isn’t strong enough to overcome the fact that he plays for the Senators.
11:26 We can’t believe it — a Duck actually shoots at Emery! Granted, it’s not much of a shot from Perry, but for once in the postseason someone decided to put the puck on net against these guys rather than looking for an extra pass.
9:15 We lied! Baby Crunchy is out there! And he gets a tricky little shot from the corner.
9:05 WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Put Baby Crunchy on the ice and magic happens! He forces a turnover at the Senators boards, and Teemu taps a soft pass to McDonald, who beats Emery up high.
8:32 Penner is a sucky, sucky loser. He gets the puck at the side of the net with Emery with his head in the clouds, but hurries his backhand and misses the wide-open net.
7:12 The Ducks are crazy fired up by their goal and proceed to stage a massively hard-hitting, relentless shift in Ottawa’s zone, but aren’t able to score. And to think — this was all kick-started by Baby Crunchy!
6:54 We come back from commercial to see an interview with Redden on the bench. The player sitting next to him is having the front of his sweater scrubbed vigorously by a towel-wielding trainer. Odd.
6:01 Pookie is beginning to think the important factor in this playoffs is just the Drew Factor. Not the Drew Stafford Factor, or the Drew Miller Factor specifically. Just the Drew Factor.
5:46 After an offsides whistle, that little bitch Comrie fires a slapshot into Jackman’s foot, so Jackman flattens him with a bearpaw swat at his head. We agree it’s a stupid penalty, but Pookie points out that if she met Comrie on the street she’d want to do that, too.
4:05 We delight at Nieder taking a totally unnecessary shot into the back of an already-falling Senator. Way to be needlessly vicious to those guys, Nieder! All while driving a Prius. What more could we ask for?
3:04 Doc gets all excited at a sort of nascent fight-esque exchange between May and Neil. Schnookie: “Why are those two guys even in the lineup?”
2:14 Because VS hasn’t given us a lineup, and because we don’t know the Ducks roster very well, we are only just wrapping our minds around the implications of Baby Crunchy skating tonight. Does this mean no Motzko?
1:56 Baby Nieder jars a puck loose from a typically butterfingery Emery, but can’t figure out how to score.
0:00 Okay, things didn’t start well here, but we like how the Ducks rebounded from the Senators’ strong start. We especially like the hustle of McDonald to beat out an icing and almost get a good scoring chance right as the clock winds down. Our assessment to date: so far it’s been an awesome game.
FIRST INTERMISSION
The game might be more important than any that preceded it, but the VS intermission show is just as inane as usual.
While we appreciate the Baby Crunchy slurping from the VS crew, we do not like how Clement intros the discussion by chortling that the Miller family had to send Drew out to try to beat the Senators since Ryan failed. Come on, Bill. Crunchy was getting the job done. It was his teammates who failed, like the failing failures they are. Stupid fucking Buffalo…
This intermission feels like it’s going on forever. That’s one of the things that really drove us crazy in 2003 when we were lucky enough to be able to attend Cup Final games; they have extra-long intermissions and commercial breaks, we assume for all the imagined extra advertising dollars. So the games are really strangely long and have tons of bizarre downtime. You need to bring a long book with you to the games to read between all the whistles.
SECOND PERIOD
Oh, yay! A Preissing mic’d up! It’s like VS reads us or something! Awww… that was surprisingly just full of lots of on-ice direction-giving to teammates, but it was still charming.
19:01 The Ducks come out skating pretty much the same way they left the last period, and Redden ends up getting called for hooking.
17:46 After the puck is frozen in front of Emery’s net (not necessarily by Emery, mind you), VS shows us a slo-mo replay of an earlier tricky deflection that is blocked by Volchenkov. It’s really kind of telling how Volchenkov and Phillips are lined up in front of the net approaching the concept of defense as “literally having to play goal so your goalie doesn’t have to”.
16:35 Giggy is forced to make a save for the first time since early in the first period.
16:08 Our Stanley Cup Final boyfriend, Getzlaf, decides to see how many cross-checks he’s allowed to get away with on the little bitch. The final count is six. Again, we’d be perfectly happy to engage in similar behavior against Comrie were we ever so unfortunate to have to meet him, but that penalty is every which kind of stupid. It’s hard to believe a team with discipline issues as bad as Anaheim’s was able to get this far in the playoffs.
15:24 After a sequence of scary-fast puck movement and a total unraveling by the PK unit in front of the net, Redden rings a goal in off the corner of the crossbar and post. We doubt Giggy’s concentration on that shot was aided by Pahlsson throwing his stick at him.
We are in agreement now that Carlyle should announce to his bench that the next guy to take a penalty is getting benched, regardless of who he is, what the penalty is for, and how desperately his presence might be needed on the ice. That tactic worked for Larry Robinson in 2000.
13:26 The Ducks are officially not skating well anymore — happy, Getzi? Way to take an idiot penalty and hand the momentum over to the other team. At any rate, the whistle is blown again on the Ducks, this time for a neutral-zone trip by Beauchemin, who, if we were coaching, would not be seeing the ice again tonight.
13:02 Pahlsson is also now stapled to the imaginary bench in our minds: he puts the Ducks down two men by slashing Alfredsson. (Pookie: “We’ve seen Nieder do it, scoring while down two men. It’s happened before, it could happen again…”)
11:30 Something crazy happens off-camera after Emery handles a Ducks rink-length clear. All of a sudden Doc is screaming, Emery’s nowhere near his net, and the puck is coming down that direction but goes wide of the goal. Wha-huh?
9:44 The Baby Crunchy Line gets set up in the offensive zone, but a pass from McDonald to the point skips all the way down the ice. Eddie, like everyone else with at least a passing interest in Anaheim, is developing a man-crush on Baby Crunchy.
6:55 Schnookie sets the neighborhood dogs to barking by loudly screaming “Come on, come on!!!” when the Ducks fourth line gets some pressure in tight in front of Emery’s net. The shift fizzles out, though, as they all insist on over-passing to the point. Yeah, the Devils were capable of doing that, too.
5:47 We come back from commercial to see a different angle of the earlier Emery giveaway on the Senators PP. It turns out he handed the puck straight to Getzi at center ice, and Getzi shanked the shot. Pookie sighs, “Getzi, I would have gone out and bought your sweater if you’d scored on that.” It’s clearly Getzlaf’s loss.
4:32 The Penner/Perry/Getzi line gets a glorious chance, but stupid Perry has his head up his ass while drifting through the crease and fails to realize he should have jumped all over that loose puck while Emery was looking the other direction.
3:59 Having been informed by hockeygirl that there’s been a Crunchy sighting on the Canadian feed of this game, Schnookie is now totally obsessed. During this stoppage VS gives us a slow pan through the crowd up to the VS booth and lingers lovingly on Keith Jones. Schnookie: “Why are they showing me Jonesie? I get to see him during the fucking intermission.”
2:06 Spezza decides defensive responsibility is for losers, and gives the puck away twice on this shift. The puck is finally frozen by Emery beside his net after a shot from Nieder at the point bounces high over him and he has to fall back nearly into his net. From the angle we’ve got it looks like that was closer than it really was, and Pookie bitterly complains, “Review that. It clearly went into the net.”
0:59 Ottawa gets a really lucky bounce as Emery directs a massive rebound straight to a charging Baby Crunchy, but the puck leaps over his stick.
0:00 While this remains quite a doozy of a game, we didn’t like that period much at all. Stupid Anaheim and their stupid discipline issues. We also go into the intermission grumbling, “If they can interview Jerry Bruckheimer and Cuba Gooding, Jr., they can interview Crunchy.”
SECOND INTERMISSION
We have nothing to say about this intermission other than “EWWWW!!!!!!!” Yeah, VS interviewed the little bitch. All it took was one shot of Comrie smugging it up in his dumb backwards baseball cap for us to completely stop paying attention and fixate even more about how utterly devoid of Crunchy this broadcast has been. Does VS think the American audience doesn’t care about him? Because we think we speak for everyone when we say, “More Crunchy!”
THIRD PERIOD
Doc and Eddie lead us back from intermission with a jocular discussion of the official scoring for Ottawa’s first goal. Comrie, Fisher, Comrie, Fisher… we really don’t care, fellas.
Getzi is mic’d up tonight, too! It’s like IPB Boyfriend night on mic’d up! We get to hear what it sounds like up close and personal as Getzi behaves like an idiot and beats on Comrie. He really sounds like a dolt.
18:16 Dustin Penner is really the weak link on the Getzi/Perry/Penner line. We think he should be replaced by Baby Crunchy. Actually, Pookie thinks he should be replaced by Drew Stafford in a Penner sweater, then adds, “I’m now going to be obsessed that somewhere out there, not necessarily in this arena, Staffy’s doing something. Stupid VS.”
17:01 Emery freaks out trying to cover a shot from McDonald, but Selanne can’t manage to do anything with the rebound before Redden pushes him over onto Emery.
16:16 When Schnookie mentions during a stoppage in play, “I haven’t written anything about this period yet,” Pookie responds, “That’s because nothing’s happened. I have no idea what to think of this period so far because Anaheim hasn’t taken a stupid penalty yet.”
15:12 Penner is the worst player in the history of the NHL. He has a fantastic opportunity on a grotesque rebound off a Perry shot, but does this stumbling, twirling buffoon move instead and the puck ends up rolling harmlessly away.
14:18 WOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!! Getzi realizes he’s going to have to take care of things himself since his linemates are incompetent boobs; he blazes with the puck down the wing, walks straight in toward Emery, and slips a soft backhand through Rayzor’s lazy five-hole.
13:23 With the crowd in full throat that the Sens should have been called for too many men, and the Ducks driving hard all over the Ottawa zone, Schubert gets called for slashing.
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! After commercial VS finally gives us a Crunchy interview. Crunchy sounds drunk. We suppose it’s pretty hard for him to say that Baby Crunchy deserves to be here instead of him, no matter how much he loves his little brother. At least, it would be hard for either of us if we were in his place. (Schnookie worries that Crunchy looks like he has a lot of split ends. The guy clearly has difficulty taking care of himself and desperately needs her tender loving.)
11:42 With Emery doing his patented “I am totally incapable of freezing the puck clean” schtick, the Ducks get a bunch of chances at loose pucks in the crease, but don’t score. Grr.
10:54 We are very quiet and subdued now. Pookie speaks for all of us when she breaks the silence with, “Now that they’ve talked to Crunchy I don’t know what to fixate on.”
10:23 The Pahlsson line ends up with a clear-cut one-on-Emery, but the shot is stopped. (Notice how we say that passively, as if the shot stopped itself. We. Will. Not. Give. Him. Credit. For. Anything.)
9:52 Meszaros gets called for interference.
9:21 Again, something miraculously comes between a shot (this time by Getzi) and the Ottawa net. We’re not sure what it was, but Doc says something about a legpad save.
8:41 Pookie stumbles artistically over her words and decides she is henceforth going to call Emery “Ray Hummery”.
6:52 Niedermayer. Ass on the bench. Now. And don’t get up again until Game 2. He gets called for hooking.
5:42 After nearly coughing the puck up at the point, Baby Nieder decides to make up for his lousy stick handling and just bulls the pointman over, pushing him until the play goes offside.
3:07 We go into commercial with Doc panting from the exertion of his call. This game has been, in a word, awesome.
2:51 WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (You would think the Devils just scored for how we responded to this goal…) Baby Nieder beats Spezza around behind the net after Meszaros takes himself out of position for an attempt at a big hit, and shovels a rolling, bouncing puck to a wide-open Moen in the slot. Moen amazingly just whacks his stick at the puck and strikes it perfectly to beat Emery and take the lead.
0:55 With players falling all over the blue paint, Giggy manages to keep his cool and covers a Phillips shot from the point.
0:43 We should not be even remotely surprised that the most overrated player in the NHL (yes, even more overrated than Emery) takes an idiotic penalty for the Ducks in this time of need. Nice one, Pronger.
0:07 Giggy is an absolute beast, stopping a point-blank shot from Fisher with a flashing, reflex wave of his glove.
0:00 WOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!! Now that was a hockey game! It was, dare we say it, well worth the wait.
Hmm… You know I love you both but I don’t know if I can handle this Sens hate… Birthday or not, Schnook… :P
Four words, HG: they beat the Devils! Isn’t that reason enough for us to dislike them?
Yes. True. Fine. But but but… sigh. Okay. We’ll agree to disagree.
Y’know I’ve liked Anaheim less and less as the playoffs went on and now I’m left sitting here thinking, “I just dislike both these teams so much!” Can I just cheer for an outbreak of the plague?
They just showed Crunchy in the crowd. Just to let you know.
HG, agreeing to disagree is, I think, the best approach here! :-)
Meg, I so hear that. I have to admit, in 2004 I just turned the TV off when the playoffs got down to Calgary and Tampa. Of course, the thought of not watching hockey when there’s some on, even as distasteful a matchup as this one, is so hard!
I hate VS!!! Why is it Canadian TV will show Crunchy in the crowd but we Americans don’t get to see him??? I’m now going to obsessively stare at what crowd I can see in our picture in the hopes of spotting him.
He was wearing a white dress shirt. Ryan Smyth is also in the crowd. Good luck. Maybe you could sport a monocle and that would help.
Hockeygirl, Crunchy looked like he’d rather be anywhere else than in Anaheim.
Of course, the thought of not watching hockey when there’s some on, even as distasteful a matchup as this one, is so hard!
Yeah, I’m watching myself. And I do find myself hoping for the Senators to win, but I’m also enjoying it every time Emery messes up of Neil gets hit. And periodically hoping for bad things to happen to other Sens (read: Comrie). And I’m happy about the younger Miller playing well. So I’m not being a very good temporary cheerer at all.
It has been a good game to watch thus far though, painful though that is to admit.
Amy, you are so right. SoCal doesn’t really seem like his scene AT all but brotherly love or something… :)
Thought you’d like to know CBC is interviewing Crunchy about his baby brother. Scanning your coverage, I think the CBC has been way better – talked about Drew before the game started as well as lots about unknowns like May.
CBC interviewed Crunchy during the intermission. He said he almost started crying when his brother took the ice (aww).
It was a much better interview than the one CBC did with Smyth earlier.
Meg, Baby Crunchy is like a little baby Buffaslug! Trying to worm his fuzzy, sluggy way into your heart. Or something. Sigh. This blows.
Amy and HG, Crunchy looks unhappy because he’d clearly rather be watching this game with me at stately IPB Manor. He’s a Maple Hoo kind of guy.
CheGordito and Amy, I almost wish I hadn’t heard that. I am now completely BESIDE MYSELF at the dreadful Crunchylessness of the VS feed. I will generously reward any IPB reader who can rewind and record Crunchy’s interview and send it to me, even if it’s just taking a video of their TV screen with their cell phone. HG, I’m looking at you…
Indeed. I’m doing research. Based on his roster pic he would appear to be somewhat less asymmetrical than Crunchy, but he is listed as 6’2″ and 174 pounds so he would seem to be similarly scrawny. I hope his legs don’t look like Crunchy’s though, because if they do I’ll be rather concerned about them snapping like twigs. He doesn’t look oddly proportioned but my tv is very crappy so I can’t really tell.
Baby Crunchy is definitely more symmetrical than Big Crunchy, but he lacks that distinctive “monocle brow” that makes us always want to say to Crunchy, “You look surprised.” So he’s clearly less lovable. As for his legs, I can only hope he has the trademark Miller quadzillas!
Sorry – cannot rewind on rabbit ears.
I don’t know if they post interviews, but the games can be viewed online (in poor quality) at least in Canada. Check out:
http://www.cbc.ca/sports/hockey/stanleycup2007/streams/
Oh crap. I didn’t even think of that. The channel got changed and it didn’t remember when I came back. Sorry hun!
Thanks, CheGordito, we’ll check out the link after the game. And HG, your plaque in the IPB Gentle Reader Hall of Fame is now going to have an asterisk on it.
Noooooooo!!!! My mind is only coming back with the revival of Sparkle Pants! I’m not up to speed! Pleasepleasepleaseplease? *sobs*
Oh, VS interviewed Crunchy! And he said he almost started crying when BabyCrunchy came out and the U.S. anthem was being sung. Maybe he was tearing up ‘cuz of how painful Stephen Stills was? What a sweet guy!
Okay, HG, we’ll let it slide… this time! :-)
Emme, I think it totally was that awful anthem rendition that got Crunchy choking up!
Thank you, Schnookie. You know I missed you and Pookie terribly, right? My stati missed yours too.
Our stati haven’t been the same since you’ve been gone!
Tomorrow, my friend. Tomorrow, I will be back. For good. Until I go away on Thursday for a conference. Can you tell I’m not paying attention to the game? When I get stressed, my reaction is avoidance.
I’m taking you at your word, HG! And you’re stretching our cognitive capacity by keeping us responding to the comment thread while trying to keep a game diary. My brain is smoking right now!
Sorry! I know you missed me too. I’m just keeping you on your toes is all. I have to make for lost time.
I must admit that some of the biggest highlights of the game were off ice. When the Canadian broadcast interviewed Drew Miller I could barely contain myself thinking how excited some of you (you know who you are) at IPB would be. Then in the 2nd intermission there was an extended interview with Ryan and I was quite beside myself with glee (which is odd, b/c I know Pookie & Schnookie would be watching the US broadcast, but still, it somehow counted in my mind). And of course when Drew set up the goal I was picturing the wild jubilatory celebration at IPB and I felt life *really* is good.
Cole & Neale drive me bonkers most of the time and I did find great satisfaction screaming at the screen when they continually talked about Drew being in his first playoff game when the other members of the broadcast had repeatedly said (not to mention the graphics on the screen) that it was his second.
Oh, and this is just mean rumour-mongering gossip, but they showed Ryan Smyth sitting in-between his wife and Hummery’s goaltending coach – then for the interview he switched places with the goalie coach so he’d be at the end of the row. I thought Mr. Goalie Coach was mackin’ on Ryan’s wife while Ryan was busy with the interview, which caused me to chortle.
P.S.
with Arnold Schwarzenegger, who Pookie hopes walks up to Emery and says, “You’re killing the Earth with your car.”
This totally cracked me up. I could totally picture it and hear the way it would sound coming from Arnold. Not to mention the look on Emery’s face.
Funny you should mention it, Icing, as I delivered that particularly witty bon mot in my bestest Arnold impersonation voice!
All manners of rumors and speculation are welcome at IPB! You heard it here first…
Now THAT was an SCF game.
And Baby Crunchy looked like someone pickled Crunchy proper.
That was a game and a half, wasn’t it?
As for Baby Crunchy, we think we have a new nickname for him: CrunchyPickles! How about that instead of Miller Lite, Earl?
I’ve opted to call him CrunchyJr. Thanks for the inspiration, ladies. And I would have been around more myself but I had my own liveblog to contend with. Safe to say it’s far less optimistic than yours ;P
As much as I heart Getzlaf (being particularly attached to any one from the 2003 draft class and the 2005 Canadian World Junior Team – Getzi fits both), and hate on Emery’s smugness they do share something in common. Getzi drives an electric blue Hummer – an H2 to be exact – to work. And now that he doesn’t carpool with Perry, it practically undoes all the Prius driving goodness of the Niedermayers. I guess they could all talk car shop with the Governator.
Sherry, we just finished reading your diary; good work! Sorry your team lost… okay, not really, but you know what we mean. We’re so glad to see the Crunchy nickname catching on; it’s just so much more distinctive than “Ryan Miller”, isn’t it?
Kikeri — NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! This is terrible, terrible news. Getzi is dead to us. Dead. To. Us. Here’s hoping he reads this and see the error of his ways. Sheesh. I feel like I need to go out and buy a TerraPass to make up for his thoughtless car choice. Wait, maybe he had it converted to run on hydrogen? Yeah, that’s the ticket! (But seriously, at least it’s not a Hummer-Lamborghini combo.)
Oh, and yay 2003 draft class — draft class of our very own Zach Parise!
Sorry, but Miller Lite seems to be the ticket, for at least the next game.
Way to go the Omen!!!! Can I please fondle more love towards Pahlsson and his shadowtroop?!
A great game to be at, I spent a while wondering whether the smart move was to sell those tickets for ridiculous prices, but in the end, we had just enough Ducks fans to pull it out. Yeah!!!
BTW: this is the most I have ever seen Scotty and Pronger paired up even strength–they are taking the Spezza line VERY serious. Pretty gutsy to throw that lineup move in on the SCF, but I’ll take it.
Tying two comments together here, we’ve decided to start a new baseless rumor. I recently read that every time you throw out an aluminum can instead of recycling it, you are wasting as much fuel as could fill the can. We decided tonight that Hummery drives around in his Hummer throwing soda cans filled with gasoline out the windows. Getzi, meanwhile, drives around in his Hummer which he’s converted to run on cooking oil, picking up Hummery’s garbage and properly disposing of it. See, he can still be our Finals boyfriend!
Pookie – sorry to say it is so. Check it out for yourself on nhl.com. It’s the Getzlaf video feature under the complete series coverage.
Earl, attending a game like that is priceless. IPB’s glad you didn’t sell your tickets. We were looking for you in your green shirt and discovered a surprising number of people showed up in green.
As for the Miller Lite thing, you can keep going with that, the lazy choice, that’s fine. But know that he’ll always be CrunchyPickles to us!
As for the Spezza line, if Pronger and Nieder are going to shut them down that well, why not go for it? Now if only those two can quit it with the ridiculously stupid penalties…
Ok, Kikeri, I was devastated at first, but having watched the Getzi video, I think I have solved the problem. Obviously they wanted to film him on his commute to work, but the camera crew didn’t fit into his Honda Insight, so he rented the biggest car he could find. That’s gotta be it! It’s just gotta!
Oh, Getzi, you’ve let me down.
And Pookie, who commutes an hour one-way to work everyday, adds that we’ll all just ignore that Getzi was driving with one hand on the wheel, his cell phone in the other and his eyes everywhere but on the road. Safety Buffalo says there are other people on the road too, moron!
CBC interviewed Crunchy during the intermission. He said he almost started crying when his brother took the ice (aww).
Please. I know my Crunchy and while I’m sure he loves Baby Crunchy bunches, I think he was crying because he knows he should be playing in the Cup finals and would be if not for his CRAP ASS TEAMMATES!
(I’m moving through the the acceptance spectrum, okay?)
I wasn’t really that upset about working tonight, but it sounds like I missed a good game! Alas I’m missing the next one too. Boooo.
If you’d have to like Corvo for that, I’d have to like him for playing college hockey where I go to school now…and I’m not really okay with that. So I think you should keep on with the non-like. Dislike? I like non-like better. ANYWAY.
And after hearing Sherry explain the Crunchy thing to me this weekend I wholly support it and am sad that I never had the chance to use it when it could have come up frequently.
Heather, your employers really need to stop scheduling you on hockey nights. It’s just not right!
All this Hummer talk is making me feel guilty about my environment destroying ways and I don’t even own a car…
Heather, there are some things you can’t ever be expected to wholly accept, and the Sabres tank job this Spring certainly counts as one of them. I personally have no doubt Crunchy’s tears were all about his stupid teammates failing him. NO DOUBT.
Steph, I’m completely on board with this “non-like” thing. It’s stronger and less reasoned than “dislike”, right? And don’t worry about missing the Crunchy boat this Spring — you’ll be able to start right in next season with it!
Meg, that’s the whole point of the environment: GUILT!! If it helps at all, yes, I drive a Prius, but I also work 2.5 miles from home and should ride a bike. But I’m fat and lazy and don’t bother. I really don’t have a leg to stand on, do I?
Getzi is dead to us. Dead. To. Us.
YES! Best. News. Ever.
See, he can still be our Finals boyfriend!
NO! Take it back!
Oh, Getzi, you’ve let me down.
YES! Mwaa haaa haa…
As long as I can cling to my misguided belief that Getzi just doesn’t know any better about that Hummer (he really is a dolt, isn’t he?), he will remain my Finals boyfriend! So take that!
Exactly! Dislike means you probably actually had to put time and effort into the decision. Non-like is kind of like that thing where you don’t want to eat vegetables when you’re a kid just because they’re green – you don’t actually KNOW you specifically don’t like them, but it’s a safe bet.
Ohhh, Steph, that’s a perfect definition for non-like. Because the Senators are SO the unappetizing green vegetable of the NHL!
I so totally agree about the anthems. I almost had to leave during the anthem, but I couldn’t, not with it being Memorial Day. The girl who did the Canadian anthem was really good. She had a very pretty voice.
I have been in a quandry. Which team do I really dislike worse? I am an Oilers fan, which clearly sets me up to root against the Ducks, merely on the Pronger factor alone (damn him, he shouldn’t get his ring), but then alas, we have the Emery factor on the Sens, and I think he is a total ASS-HAT. So what do I do??? As I contemplated my life altering decision (helped along with a bottle of wine), I realized that I could *gasp* look past the Pronger situation (especially since it is eased with the Baby Crunchy factor) long before I could look past the Emery issues.
All I can say is GOOOOO DUCKS!!!
(…mind you….still need to have copious amounts of booze available for me to cheer for the ducks…..)
(…mind you….still need to have copious amounts of booze available for me to cheer for the ducks…..)
That’s not uncommon, even for this career Duck fan.
Ahhh, the playoffs! When we as devoted fans find out exactly how strong our moral fiber really is. I’m pleased to note that my anti-Ducks integrity lasted only until they were playing Vancouver — and no booze was even necessary for me to back off my previous “Cheer for the Ducks? Over my dead body!” stance. (Yeah, my non-like for Luongo is just that strong…)
Earl,
Being Canadian I have a hard time with any beer named “Lite” however Miller Lite for baby crunchy is perfect, you know, like less filling or something like that!!
After watching Babycrunchy help setup one of the Duck goals I have now declared my apartment “A Crunchy Free Zone” I now have to drown my cereal in milk just so it doesn’t crunch… no more southern fried chicken, chips, well you get the point… so ya if he needs a nickmane I would rather boycott Miller Lite than to have to drown my snap crackle and pop.
All the Sen’s ride bikes at the end of the game; does that count towards this earth first thingy?? (See Shannahan’s Sen’s interview, truly funny stuff.)
I’m with HG in that in spite of all the Sens hate coming from IPB Manor…. you do make a wonderful read.
Enjoy the next game. Almost forgot on TSN they have Tom Preissing interviewing Chris Kelly… rapid fire question style really funny stuff.
Wow, de-crunchifying one’s life sounds like a lot of work! I recall that in 2001 during the Devils run to the Finals somehow Pookie ended up deciding orange foods and muffins were unlucky. It is shockingly easy to avoid those things. Anything crunchy, though? That’s got to be tricky.
That Shanahan stuff about the Sens and their bikes was one of the comic high points of the season! Not that it helps me to like the Sens any more, but… ;-)
I can’t wait to get home from work so I can check out my Sens boyfriend’s interviewing skills on TSN — thanks for the tip!
I love you all, even you Sen lovers–I’m so lonely in my hockey love here in the Cap. Dist of NYS. Schnookie, just curious–why do not-love Luongo?
Gabby, I think the easier question to answer would be “why would anyone actually like Luongo?” Just kidding! In all seriousness, I don’t like him because I’m a Devils fan. I mean, Broduer’s my guy, and I don’t like people suggesting Luongo’s better. I’m irrational that way.
Oh, I have a huge list of reasons why I love Luongo! But I can see the Brodeur reason. One of my sales reps (I’m a buyer in a bookstore) engineered his book signing in New Jersey and said he was quite the man. I’m not sure if she meant that completely positively, but Devil Love makes sense to me.
On the few, brief occasions where I’ve interacted with Marty in person, he didn’t exactly leave me thinking “What a sweetheart!” But he wasn’t blatantly a jerk either. So I don’t know what to make of your reps’ report! :-) Anyway, unless they’re markedly inferior to Marty (like, say, Crunchy?) I tend to regard other teams’ goalies with narrowed eyes and a soft, uncontrollable hiss.
I’ve only just gotten around to watching this (all hail TiVo) with the game diary on my screen, and I have to say you guys did make the whole experience a lot more pleasant. I’m surprised at how much I really really really don’t want the Sens to win this. Not that I want the Ducks to go all the way, I just don’t want the Sens to. If that makes sense in any way.
RE: Marty IRL, I’ve met him twice, and he was a really nice guy both times. Distant, but a totally nice guy. And if you have no idea who he is, like I did the first time, and someone who does know casually drops that you’re a goalie, he’ll say he’s a goalie too. To which reacting with genuine surprise will cause him to laugh and explain. And you will die and wish you were not so un-knowing. And then he’ll ask you 101 questions about where you play and pretend he actually cares in a quite convincing fashion.
I hiss at Luongo, just because I think I could deep-fry something in the amount of oil in his hair. I’m shallow like that.
That IS the perfect description of the Sens!
And look at you using non-like so proficiently, Schnookie! (I’ll ignore that it was in reference to Luongo who I have an irrational sort-of-like (that’s like the blue ice cream that’s really vile tasting but you eat it JUST because it’s blue and that’s cool) for.
I do have a serious crush on Luongo, which is somewhat disturbing for me since I can a) agree with all of you on his serious abuse of hair products and b) I am not a particular fan of goalies -they are just not right in the head.
Mags, Thanks for that tidbit on Marty. The only public/famous person I’ve ever spoken to was Dr. Ruth Westheimer, and she scared me bad.
I’m happy I’m not the only one with an irrational Luongo love. Ickily, I’ve decided it’s because he reminds me of my brother (big crazy brown eyes, greasy hair, moods that go from love-u to kill-u to crying in about 60 seconds, no desire to move away from Mom). If you look at the feature on him on the Canucks site, his wife Gina married HER brother–he’s sitting next to them and the resemblance is striking. Euw on us!
It was a much better interview than the one CBC did with Smyth earlier.
Love him as a player, but he’s got to be the only interview subject less interesting than a stick in the mud. The man seems absolutely incapable of saying anything (airport press conferences notwithstanding).