Tag: game seven

San Jose Sharks Clarification

The Bruins have already won their first round series, and they already know they will be playing Montreal in round two. Game one is tomorrow night.

The first round will come to an end tonight after the completion of three game sevens. New York and Philadelphia, Colorado and Minnesota, and the game I want to talk about right now, San Jose and Los Angeles.

I beat on the San Jose Sharks a lot. One of my golden rules for playoff predictions is to always pick against the Sharks. One might think it’s because I hate them. No, that is not the case. In fact, I think they are awesome. During the regular season, in the days before the last lock out, I would often find myself dialing in Sharks games on the radio (by radio I mean iPad) when I couldn’t fall asleep at night.

Why then do I give them such a hard time? Simple. Playoff history. There was a stretch 5-10 years ago where I picked them to at least make the Western Finals if not win the Stanley Cup every year. They were a powerhouse. They owned the West during the regular season, year after year. They were awesome to watch. Then the playoffs would come and they would turtle and get their asses whooped by some clearly inferior team and I would have a big black mark on my playoff predictions.

At some point along the way I instigated the Sharks doctrine. Now I only pick them to win a series when their opponent is supremely awful. More often than not, when I pick against them I am picking right.

It just so happens that this year they matched up with the Kings. The Kings and the Sharks (and the Oilers, although not recently) have been the Western Conference teams I followed, again prior to last year’s insulting lock out. The Kings have an A-list goalie. I would have picked them against anyone. It was just a nice deal that I could pick them over San Jose.

Game seven is tonight, and I have one more huge reason to root against the Sharks.

We all remember the mental breakdown all Bruins fans suffered in 2010. The B’s took that magical 3-0 series lead over Philly and it turned into a curse as we watched in horror as Philly won game seven. It’s only happened three times in NHL history. Three times, a team has blown a 3-0 series lead and lost the round 4-3. The Bruins are just the most recent example.

Tonight, however, history could be made once again. The Sharks murderlized the Kings in the first two games. Then they won game three in overtime. Since then? The Sharks have lost by three goals scores in games four through six. The series is now tied at three games a piece. The Sharks have home ice advantage in tonight’s game seven, but I am optimistic that both the Sharks doctrine will be upheld, and that the Bruins will no longer be looked at as the last team to blow a 3-0 series lead.

The Kings. The Los Angeles Kings. They must, MUST win this game tonight. They must put the Sharks away. They must score early and often and break their spirit. Not because I hate the Sharks, not because I am rooting for the Kings so much (the Bruins are winning the cup this year, therefore I will not have to pick a back up team to root for like I did two years ago), but because the memory of 2010 still stings me, and I want another team to go through the same misery in the hopes that it will serve as a buffer between me and the memory of the Bruins failure. Not even winning the Stanley Cup in 2011 could erase the agony of 2010. Maybe this will at least ease it a little more.

I honestly hope that some day Joe Thornton and Patrick Marleau will hoist the Cup in front of their Bay Area faithful. I mean it. Despite everything, I still consider myself to be a big Joe Thornton fan.

I just don’t want it to be this season, and I most definitely do not want to see them win tonight.

Go Kings.

Oh yes, Go Kings!

The Bruins Win Game Seven

I don’t know what to say…

Here’s the highlight video from NHL.com

Just… what the hell happened?

I had the game on the radio.  I listened intently and felt very distraught when Kessel made it 3-1.  When the Leafs went up 4-1 in the third I shut it off.

I posted the following on Facebook:

God damn it I hate being right sometimes. I knew this was coming as soon as I saw the match up. Friggin Bruins.

I guess I was wrong.  In this case I am very, very happy to be wrong.

They came out with serious energy in the first.  I was pleased by that.  They did not have that kind of energy in games five or six.  I thought they were going to be different in game seven, but instead of playing with the necessary intensity they went overboard and took bad penalties.  That took them out of the game, and then it was back to the blah blah blah of the previous two games.  They uninterestedly floated their way into the third period and the Leafs lit them up.  It’s the same garbage we’ve been seeing from them for more than two months now.  At 4-1 I was done.  I couldn’t take it anymore and I shut the radio off.  The hell with them.

That’s when they started playing for real.  Three goals in the last 10 minutes.  Where the hell was that Bruins team for the previous 2.66 games?  They had sucked like no 4th seed should ever suck and then, boom.  They are playing like contenders again.  What the hell?  Why didn’t they play that way all series?  What’s wrong with them that allows them to coast their way to the brink and then suddenly play like an all time great team?  I don’t get it.

To recap though, I have to give Tuukka Rask a break.  He did make some gigantic saves last night, and they did win a must win game with him in net.  I am not going to let him off the choke hook until they win a Cup with him as the number one goalie, the choke against Philly in 2010 will not be forgotten so easily, but he came through when we needed him to hold it together in a big game.  Granted, four goals against is a crappy game for any goalie, but he did what was necessary.

Also, Patrice Bergeron is the best player we have, and he’s been the best player we’ve had since the day he was drafted.  No offense to Joe Thornton, or Marc Savard, or Zdeno Chara, or Tim Thomas, or anyone else.  Patrice Bergeron is our best.  Watch that highlights video.  You can see it in his face.  He just decided the bullshit had to end, and he scored the game tying and game winning goals.  As we move forward in these playoffs it will be how Bergeron goes, the Bruins go.

Bring on the Rangers.

Go Bruins.

Overtime

Ok…

So my last post was me writing the Bruins off. I stopped listening and started watching a movie. Next thing I know my phone is ringing and Mike the Bass Player tells me they tied it in the final minutes. Now we are going to overtime.

So… Am I the bad luck? Superstitiously speaking, was my turning off the game what allowed them to come back? Should I not listen to overtime out of fear of jinxing the whole works?

Sometimes I hate playoffs.