Recap: Ottawa vs. Philadelphia

I was able to make the trip to Ottawa last night to see the Senators play the Flyers. Both teams have been play poorly of late. The pace of the game lagged a bit in the second period but picked up again through the third period and into a very exciting overtime. Two SHGs made for some excitement. The final score was Ottawa 3 Philadelphia 2 (SO). In general, Ottawa did not do a good job of going to the net. Some thoughts on individual performances:

Ottawa

D Wade Redden – Steady but unspectacular play from the veteran blue-liner. He failed to hold the line a couple of times early in the game, but showed great patience and hockey sense to help set up Ottawa’s second goal.
LW Dany Heatley – Not a good game. Had some chances in OT but was mostly noticed for glaring giveaways.
RW Daniel Alfredsdson – The captain was not an offensive threat this game but was great killing penalties.
C Antoine Vermette – Had a nose for the net all night. Was a couple of bounces away from a multi-goal game.
G Ray Emery – Gave up some big rebounds that fortunately bounced away from danger. But to his credit the only Flyer goals came of off deflection.
D Andrej Meszaros – His mistakes are still what I notice most about his play.
LW Cory Stillman – Great game! He was the most dangerous Senator with the puck tonight. Brilliant set up to Volchenkov in OT. Also great backchecking.

Philadelphia

D Braydon Coburn – I thought Coburn was a force tonight. He made two defensive plays that were particularly memorable.
C Daniel Briere – Missing in action. Apparently he played 20+ minutes and recorded 4 shots, but the only thing I remember about his play was his miss in the shoot-out.
D Kimmo Timonen – Good game at both ends of the rink. Great hockey sense to join the rush on the penalty kill and was rewarded with a shortie. Was a physical match against the much bigger Heatley.
C Mike Richards – Seemed to be everywhere tonight but didn’t have much of an impact.
C Jeff Carter – See Richards. Did create a great scoring chance after stripping the puck off a Senator in the neutral zone.

Three Stars

1. Cory Stillman
2. Antoine Vermette
3. Braydon Coburn

2010 Olympics

TSN recently had a poll on their website asking people to pick who they thought should be on the Canadian Men's Olympic hockey team in 2010. Two years is a long time, especially when it comes to predicting the development of young talent (and Canada has a lot of that commodity) and the erosion of old talent. But just for fun, here is the team I’d like to see in Vancouver.

Nash	Crosby	Iginla
Lecavalier	Spezza	Heatley
Gagne	Thornton	Toews
Getzlaf	M.Richards	Perry
	Sakic
Pronger	Phaneuf		Luongo
Bouwmeester	Weber		Brodeur
Redden	Green		Giguere
Campbell

One noticeable absence on the blue line is Scott Niedermayer. I question whether he will still be playing in two years. If he is, then I would select him in a heartbeat. He is the world’s second best defenseman (after Niklas Lidstrom of course). The likely deletion is Wade Redden. Or Mike Green. But the latter is just coming into his own. True, his sudden emergence is a hockey columnist's dream and as such he has been getting a lot of press lately. But I think it is well deserved. This guy has the raw skills to control the flow of a game, much like Bouwmeester does. Let's hope they both reach their potential.

Also, there are no Staals on this team. The competition for my last two forward spots was tight. I considered Eric Staal, Jonathon Toews, and Corey Perry. Though still a teenager, Toews has proven himself to be a solid two-way performer with loads of offensive potential – and he will only improve. Corey Perry is getting better every year and should be a consistent 40 goal scorer by 2010. Eric Staal has the tools to be a dominant player in the NHL (remember that he’s just 23 years old), but he seems to be regressing. I still think he will end up as a 40-50-90 first line centre. But in the end I’m partial to Winnipeggers and think Getzlaf-Richards-Perry would be an incredible 4^th line (2005 WJC team-mates; Crosby, Phaneuf, and Weber were also on that squad, the greatest junior team ever). Also, I’m not willing to give up Joe Sakic. If he’s still skating in two years, Burnaby Joe has a spot on my team. So Thunder Bay will have to wait until 2014 (if NHLers play, which is a big if) to see one of the favourite sons play for the national team. But I wouldn’t be surprised to see three Staals on that team (again, big if).

I doubt that my goalie selections are very different from what most people will choose. Marty Turco would also be a solid choice for third stringer, and I suppose Pascal Leclaire or Carey Price could be ready for such duties by then.

This exercise is very difficult because Canada has such a deep talent pool. I don’t envy the Executive Director of the team. He has a very difficult job. [And just for the record, I think that person should be Steve Yzermam. And team Canada’s coach should be Mike Babcock. The Detroit organization simply knows how to win.] Russia will be able to ice the best line (Ovechkin-Malkin-Kovalchuk, scary!) but no country can match Canada in depth. To demonstrate, I have picked a substitute team out of those not already selected:

Kariya	E. Staal	St.Louis
Morrow	Briere	Doan
B. Richards	J. Staal	Horton
Smyth	Bergeron	Carter
	Horcoff
Boyle	Seabrook		Leclaire
Phillips	Jovanovski		Ward
Regehr	Burns		Turco
Coburn

The second team includes the 2004 Hart, Art Ross, and Pearson winner (St. Louis), the 2004 Conn Smythe winner (Brad Richards), and three 2002 gold medalists in Kariya, Smyth, and Jovanovski. Plus some emerging superstars. Not too shabby for a bunch of cast-offs.

Opening Faceoff

The title of this first post was chosen simply because it suits the name of the blog. I love hockey and certainly intend that many posts here will comment on the sport. But do not expect that to be the only topic covered. My interests also extend to football and baseball.

In truth, the exact shape of this e-journal (that is, web log, or "blog" as the kids are saying these days) is yet to be determined. It is currently 3am and I really just need something to cure my insomnia. Creating a new blog seemed like a good idea. Not to say that I have given no previous consideration to this idea. I have always enjoyed sharing my thoughts with others and, frankly, they ought to enjoy it too. Moreover, I have a strong commitment to improving the world around me. And what better way is there for me to advance the cause of truth and knowledge in this hopelessly ignorant world of ours than to make the insights and revelations of my mind available to everyone with access to the inter-web?

The tentative name of this blog is "From the Off Wing". Like the name indicates, you the reader should not expect my posts to have some uniformly partisan flavour. Nor should you expect the posts to fall into a narrow set of permissible topics. Instead, I will aim to write on a wide range of subjects and from a (not quite so wide) range of perspectives, depending on my mood and what interests me at the time. These may include, but are not limited to, economics, sports, politics, cinema, literature, theology, and the art of decorative handcrafts.

It is now 3:11 and about time I gave sleep another chance. One final warning to potential readers: past experience suggests the possibility that my posting behaviour may be periodically erratic. I hope you are emotionally mature enough to deal with that. If not, thanks for stopping by. If so, many happy returns.

Regards,