Eastern Conference Final Game 1

Oho, Blersus, you sneaky vixen. First you tried to pretend you weren’t giving us this game in HD, playing all hard to get, and then at the last minute you capitulated. There’s no need to be so coquettish, but we appreciate the end result.

We anticipate a significant upgrade in game quality and intensity from yesterday’s Wings/Stars G1, but we’re looking at a significant downgrade in play-by-play. Sigh. Hi, Beninati. And you too, Eliot. (These two guys clearly did not coordinate their outfits – Joe’s got a yellowish-beige suit and a florid orange tie, and Darren’s wearing charcoal gray with a patterned fuschia tie. Is it really that hard to make sure ahead of time that you won’t clash terribly?)

After a Chris Simpson interview with a thoroughly undynamic John Stevens, we go to commercial, then come back for a nearly announcer-less full segment of a wide-angle shot of the massive, white-bedecked, explosively loud crowd. Speaking of things that have been greatly improved in quality from the game in Detroit last night.

We should mention now that we have no idea who we’re cheering for in this one. Games like this are the best – when you just sit down and wait to see which way your heart goes.

FIRST PERIOD

20:00 Oh! We didn’t time our evening very well here – our pizza arrives just as the puck is dropped. We hope nothing exciting happens just yet. (After a lingering look at Sid on the bench, Pookie says in her Sid voice, “Aw, I don’t think Gary Meadows is going to be selling the Sid model any time soon.”)

18:09 We come back to find the Flyers on the PP. We’d lament that we don’t know who took the penalty and what for, but we doubt VS would have shown us anyway.

16:53 The Flyers are unable to force any kind of play through the PK box, and Pookie speaks for all of us when she says, “Right now I’m 100% 50/50.”

15:59 Malkin shows the Flyers a bit of what they didn’t have to face against the anemic Habs in the last round, deftly ducking a check on the fly while darting through the D, but Sykora is there to be his Sykora self, missing wide on the fat rebound chance Biron coughs up at him.

13:54 The teams are trading back-and-forths in the neutral zone, and Joe tries to tell us “the hardest part for the players is the waiting” between series. Pookie: “Yeah, but you know who that’s even harder on? The fans. And we did just fine with MarioKart, so I don’t feel sorry for the players at all.”

13:41 You know what we’re 100% ZERO on? Petr Sykora. So we can’t give any kind of “WOOOO”-ish response when he takes advantage of the wheels falling off Biron, beating him on a roofed backhand while Biron has played himself terribly out of position on some nice cross-zone passing by Pittsburgh. 1-0 Penguins. Who ever would have guessed Biron could look so crappy? Oh right – we could.

11:40 We’re trying to decide whether we were happy about that goal or not, and we think we’re still in a state of balance. Although Schnookie remarks, “After last night’s game, maybe I’m just trying not to get too attached to either of these Eastern Conference teams.”

11:30 The goal light is on, the Flyers are celebrating, but the officials are vehemently waving the goal off. We’re puzzled. VS then shows us a bunch of drunk, face-painted Flyers fans at the Wachovia center, and we recoil. Pookie: “If the Vegas tranny bride wants to keep my heart, they’re going to have to limit how much I can see of Flyers fans.” There is a delay as the officials call upstairs, and it turns out that our Flyers boyfriend Mike Richards tossed the puck in off Fleury on a wraparound, and the puck was literally in the back of the net while the official was standing over it, waving off the goal. The fuck? There is no explanation, and right is quickly done, as the review ends quickly with the game 1-1. We see more footage of Flyers fans and feel a sinking pit in our stomachs. Please. We’re trying to eat.

10:19 Hey! Did you know Umberger’s from Pittsburgh? Why no, Joe, we’d never heard that. Please tell us again. And again. And again. And again. He also mentions in a rambling Umberger tangent that “R.J.” is short “Robert, Jr.” Pookie: “He and PJ hang out a lot.”

9:30 Pookie recently read the column on ESPN about how the Flyers rebuilt to quickly, and has not been able to let go of the fact that Philly offered Jeff Carter for Tomas Kaberle at this past deadline. She mentions now as he’s on the ice, “Every time I look at Carter all I can see is Kaberle. It’s awful.”

7:32 Our Flyers boyfriend is called upon to give a soundbite interview about how the team reacted to losing Timonen. He seems to be saying that Timonen is dead to them all now. Or something. He also sounds just like if Beaker from the Muppet Show was a valley girl. He’s so dreamy.

7:10 We bet it sounds a lot like “MEEMEEMEEMEEMEEMEE!!!” on the ice right now as Richards celebrates finding the puck in front of the crease when he sneaks down behind a Lupul-and-two-Pens-defenders scrum in the paint, then skates around the pile-up and fires a shot over Fleury. It’s 2-1 Flyers, and Darren says this looks like the first game of the Pens/Rangers series. So no worries, Pens fans.

6:12 We get a heads-up about what’s to come in the first intermission, and the studio host guy says cheerfully, “Plus, a profile of Detroit Red Wings defenseman Brian Rafalski!” We had been discussing last night how we had a clean break from Raffie when he left the Devils, and now seems like a new player, so Schnookie asks in the same brisk tone, “Is he related to New Jersey Devils defenseman Brian Rafalski?” Pookie: “I’d rather hear a history of the octopus than a profile of Brian Rafalski.”

5:49 HAHAHAHAHA!!!! That’s what it looks like when the wheels completely fall off a goalie! Biron tries to force things by puckhandling behind the net when there’s absolutely no need to, and ends up passing the puck through Jason Smith and straight to Hossa at the half boards. Hossa then calmly feeds the puck to Sid right in front and Sid easily beats Biron as he scrambles to get back in net. HAHAHAHAHA!!! 2-2 game.

5:24 The Umberger magic is gone, as he is artfully defended from behind by Gonchar on a breakaway, and then the Pens wheel up the other way in the blink of an eye. This game is ten zillion times more awesome than the one last night was.

3:05 We hope neither of these teams remember how to play defense any time soon. For the umpteenth time, the puck is turned over right on the blue line. This time Fleury has to make a good shoulder save on Lupul.

0:56 We all think Ryan Malone has just stuffed a wraparound shot in, but it turns out it’s just a failure of our depth perception.

0:06 AAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! With time running out and the Flyers scrambling all over the place, Malkin calmly powers down the near wing without a defender in sight (although Hatcher is lumbering over to try to lend a helping hand), and he whips a shot that goes right through the wheelless Biron. 3-2 Pens. HAHAHAHA! It’s never not funny when the Flyers think they’ve found the answers to their neverending goaltending problems, but the answer turns out to be Marty Biron. Heh.

0:00 Please, Hockey Gods, just let this pace keep up for seven games. This is awesome.

FIRST INTERMISSION

Guess what we don’t watch? That’s right! This intermission on Versus!

SECOND PERIOD

19:05 Okay, seriously, this is getting so funny it almost hurts. Hatcher turns the puck over to Malkin in the high slot, then barely manages to deflect Malkin’s shot over the net. Beninati calls it that Hatcher’s “long reach did him well there.” Yeah, except for the part where he turned the puck over to start out with, Joe.

18:21 Hatcher’s long reach does him no favors again, as he turns the puck over on an eminently playable pass from Umberger behind Biron’s net. There isn’t even any pressure on him. Pookie: “I think the game has passed him by.”

17:17 It seems like maybe the two coaches spent the intermission throwing garbage cans at their players’ heads. Both teams are content to be passively fumbling the puck around each other’s feet in the neutral zone right now.

16:25 Orpik grabs onto Hartnell (Hard As Nails Cunts!) while throwing him to the ice behind Fleury and gets called for holding. That doesn’t look like a very good call to us.

15:15 Malkin gets a breakaway, but fires wide, and our boyfriend Beaker flies in to smush him into the boards for his efforts.

15:10 Holy shit! Malkin is slow to get back after being hit, and ends up cherry picking on the penalty kill. He’s let loose on a breakaway with a fantastic rink-length pass from Gonchar, and just pulls up to blast a slapshot through Biron. It’s 4-2 Penguins, and now is a great opportunity for VS to demonstrate how inept they are at enhancing the live action with appropriate replays. They give us a look at just the goal, but neglect to show a replay of all the hits and back-and-forth up and down the rink that set it up. Come on, VS! That was chaos! Give a sense of how that entire play evolved, okay?

14:56 Carter gets called for hooking, and VS is in a state of complete confusion about what to be showing us, feeding us some more weird angles of the outlet pass to Malkin while Joe and Darren have no idea what to be talking about. We are seasoned hockey fans and we’re baffled about what’s going on here. This is sure to appeal to non-fans.

12:57 Darren tries to get all hard-hitting by saying, “Let’s face it – the Flyers only got here on the strength of Biron’s play.” Pookie: “And let’s face it – they’re not going to move on on the strength of Biron’s play.”

9:29 We’re grouchy now because VS is doing such a crappy job with this broadcast – it’s hard to write a game diary when the feed isn’t giving any replays, you know. Our enjoyment of the game will increase if it can go to overtime, and for a moment we think Umberger may have chipped into the lead with some rare-for-this-period Flyers hustle, but Fleury is no Biron, and manages to get a pad on the shot.

8:12 Sid’s line buzzes all over the Philly zone, and we try to decide which team we dislike more, as we grapple to choose sides. Pookie begins to proclaim, “Pound for pound, I think I dislike more players on the Pens than I dislike on the Flyers,” but then she mentally adjusts for Hatcher, and admits that, pound for pound, the Flyers she dislikes weigh more than the Pens she dislikes.

6:30 Biron makes a stop on a quick shot from Hossa, but kicks a long rebound right back onto his stick. It looks like Hossa is going to have no problem converting on the rebound when Biron overcommits on the shot he anticipates (but which never comes), but after skating around the prone goalie, Hossa can’t push the puck past Biron’s outstretched goal stick. Schnookie: “Wow. I didn’t think Biron had that in him.” Pookie: “Wow. I didn’t think Hossa could skate that slowly.”

3:37 Hissssss… Beninati takes Mikey C’s name in vain when he likens Hard As Nails Cunts’s hair (which Hartnell claims he’s been growing since October) to Mikey C’s famed afro. Considering that Hartnell looks, at best, unkempt, the comparison is not even remotely apt. Pookie sniffs, “Well, Hartnell’s no Mikey C, I guess.”

1:28 Is it just us, or does John Stevens have a robot herpe on his lip? Has he been making out with Chris Drury again?

0:00 That period was a bit less entertaining than the first, probably because the Flyers looked around their dressing room during the intermission and realized Biron had turned back into a pumpkin. Or maybe it was every bit as entertaining, but we were too distracted by the way it so severely taxed VS’s ability to keep up.

SECOND INTERMISSION

This break gives Pookie a chance to explain her hierarchy of things she doesn’t want to see profiles of during intermissions, listed in order of most to least palatable: “The history of the octopus in Detroit, Brian Rafalski, Mario Lemieux.”

THIRD PERIOD

19:24 We are still laughing amongst ourselves at our intermission discussion imagining Hatcher mistaking Biron for a pumpkin and carving him into a jack-o-lantern. We figure his teammates would be horrified until they realized that if Bobby Clarke was still in charge, he’d be doing exactly the same thing.

18:59 A message appears at the bottom of our screen that says, “For coverage of the Players, turn to the non-HD Versus.” Pookie spazzes for a moment, “Are they doing individual coverage of all the players on regular Versus?” Pause. “Oh, it’s the golf Players.”

18:02 Jesus Christ, but VS is plumbing new depths with their approach to replays. There is a lengthy break before a faceoff in the Philadelphia zone, and they tell us we’re about to see some highlights showing the ways the Flyers are missing Timonen, but they just show us Jones firing wide on an early power play (because Timonen would have stopped that from happening), and then a really odd angle of the second Malkin goal, from which they cut away before it’s done. We can’t even figure out what they’re showing instead of replays. This is just ridiculously awful.

16:37 Fleury’s no pumpkin! He makes a whippy glove save on a shot through modest traffic.

15:25 Hatcher hits a Pen, and Beninati describes it as “throttling.” Boomer, as Hatcher: “Derian not bite. Derian throttle.” Pookie: “Travis is like, ‘No, that’s a bite.’”

14:48 Boomer’s on a roll now – when Beninati tells us Hatcher has likened our boyfriend Beaker to Mike Modano, she explains, as Hatcher, “Name sound same.”

13:40 Briere is unable to get to a loose puck for a good scoring chance, and Pookie snaps, “If Briere wasn’t so slow…” Then she stops and admits, “I have really unreasonable expectations of how fast these guys should be.” Schnookie: “It’s because you watch the Devils all the time and you know those guys are always going at half-speed. Since the team you watch the most is capable of going twice as fast as they do in games, you just expect it of everyone else, too.”

11:53 HAHAHAHAHA!!! It looks for a moment like Carter and Upshall are maybe working a little forecheck, but Whitney just stands Carter up, face-to-face, and Carter crumples lamely to the ice, letting Whitney skate away with the puck.

10:38 The crowd is all ready to just go up when Sid leads a long rush and then tries to spread the D with some passing, but no one out there with him wants to shoot, and the play breaks down with Gonchar opting to dish to Ruutu, whose shot is easily blocked.

8:28 Whitney gets called for tripping, and Darren hilariously remarks that this PP would be a good time for Briere to show up, since he hasn’t exactly been noticeable in this game.

6:28 Still no Briere. Heh.

5:10 Shortly after Sid just misses getting enough on a shot through traffic that would have caught Biron napping, Hossa takes a stick in the face. There is no call, and the fans, apparently forgetting the one they got away with in Game 5 against the Rangers, roar their disapproval.

4:36 Hm. The Leafs are looking smarter and smarter for not giving up Kaberle, as Carter can’t finish his swaggering deke around Fleury on a surprisingly well-conceived rush by the Flyers.

1:47 The teams are trading deep-in-each-other’s-zone chances again, and Hartnell labors to set up a feed from behind the goal line to a fast-trailing Flyers d-man storming up on the play. Beninati calls it, “He puts some extra sauce on the pass to Hatcher,” and Schnookie groans, “Why would he bother?”

1:28 A scrum breaks out when Upshall and Letang shove at each other, and VS finally does something right, choosing to zoom in on Malkin swatting at Hatcher while Sykora desperately hangs on to him. Pookie: “It’s like Sykkie’s finally getting revenge for the concussion Hatcher gave him in the 2000 SCF. He’s waited eight years for this, and now he’s like, ‘I’ll hold him down, and you hit him, Geno!’”

Things peter out, and then suddenly Malone and Hatcher are bumping chests like a couple of hopped-up peacocks. The on-ice mics are just barely picking up their conversation, which Boomer reimagines thusly:

Malone: “What an ugly sweater!”
Hatcher: “Well I’ve been wearing it all night!”

There is a long stoppage during which we are appalled that any sporting arena outside New Jersey would even dare to play Bon Jovi (and we find it pathetically sad that when the PA cuts out, the fans keep singing. People, that’s a New Jersey anthem! Are you trying to show off how like Devils fans you are?), and then the organist kicks in with a too-fast version of our favorite arena ditty. Pookie says, aghast, “God, they can’t even play ‘The Rangers Suck’ right.” Pause. “That is what it’s called, right?”

The manpower situation shakes out to end the game on a Pittsburgh power play.

0:42 Fleury makes a save on a Carter shot, and VS gives us a mini highlight reel of his saves tonight. Pookie: “I kind of refuse to believe that Marc-Andre Fleury is the real deal.”

0:04 Coburn finish things off with a hooking penalty in his attempt to keep Sid from making an empty-netter happen.

0:00 That was delightful! And also sad! We’re still 50/50 on this one, and have high hopes for this series. Our only disappointment tonight was that there was a bit of a letdown, and the final score wasn’t 700-698.