Now That's Crazy

You gotta wonder if someone in Boston has a head injury.  In a deadline-day deal, we have this story that Boston has traded... to acquire... Wade Redden. On purpose.

I... uh...

I really have nothing.

Under The Bus With You

I don't understand, I really don't.

Auld ends up being in goal when the vastly better Boston Bruins come in to town and, horror of horrors, manage to beat the inferior Ottawa Senators. And somehow that's Auld's fault, and he should be banished forthwith for failing to steal a game against the better team.

Really?

For once I actually watched the game. I wanted to watch it so much, I watched it in french while I was in Montreal this weekend. Thank god the Canadiens were not playing or I wouldn't have gotten to see it. I even manage to watch the whole game, even sticking it out when it was 4-1 with ten to go.

Frankly the only goal I blame Auld for was that weak one -- Marchande's one in the first. The rest of them I blame on the rest of the team for A) poor defensive coverage and B) only turning the offense on in the last quarter of the third period.

You want to talk about defensive coverage? Fine, let's talk shots on goal:

Team	1st	2nd	3rd	Total
BOS	13	16	9	38
OTT	9	6	15	30

...I don't wanna talk about it any more.

And about the last period: look, guys, these games are 60 minutes long, not five. It's fun and all watching the heart-attack-inducing last gasp desperation plays and all, but this is about winning, not trying really hard.

So in summary, yes, Auld was the losing goaltender. But no, he wasn't the problem. The problem is a little further up the ice, and the sooner we recognize that and start dealing with it, the sooner we can start having a honest discussion about goaltending.

Whambulance

Having watched the video (and enjoyed the gory close-up) of Bruins' defense Chara spreading Montreal's Pacioretty into the center stanchion. Pacioretty lost consciousness due to the play and has damaged at least one vertebra.

Personally I agree with the on- and off-ice calls of this play -- it was a late hit on a player who had already chipped on the puck. That's text book interference, and that's what Chara served two minutes for.

The howls from the Montreal fan base can be ignored as partisan ignorance. With the way the random Wheel Of Discipline spins in the NHL, it was quite possible that this might have been seriously punished; the media loves to get out in front of these things so they can fill the moments until the next game with "I told you so" type comments.

The League's result of the Wheel Of Discipline is actually the right call. This was an unfortunate injury from a play, which while being "against the rules", was not worthy of further punishment.

This is not the kind of "violence" that the NHL needs to get rid of. The dangerous hits blindsiding players (such as claimed Spezza earlier this year) and the hits to the head (such as has claimed Crosby's year) have to go.

And the fighting has to go to, but for me that's an old saw.

I'm no fan of violence in hockey, but I don't think this incident is really worthy of the coverage it is getting.

Big Steaming Pile of Meh

So yeah, I should probably do some kind of fare-well post for the dearly departed Chris Campoli, but to be honest I really can't be bothered. Campoli showed flashes of competence without being noticeably worse than his team mates most evening, and all for a relatively affordable amount of money. In other words, the ideal 3rd-pair defense man.

Problem is, this team is drowning in 3rd-pair defense players; so now Campoli is gone in exchange for a draft pick.

Meh.

In other meh news, Ottawa claims goalie Curtis McElhinney off of waivers, intercepting his move from Anaheim to Tampa. This is clearly a move to ensure that Lehner spends more time working the AHL than riding airplanes between Bingo and wherever Ottawa is playing.

With all the changes that have been happening, I find it rather hard to get excited about the team for the rest of the year. Maybe I am a "frontrunner" or a bandwagon-rider, but I look at this roster and think "so what?"

I did have the Boston game on for a while, and while it was dry, it showed a few flashes of entertainment. But only a few. It did make the perfect cap for the awful day I had at work on Tuesday: slightly painful, with only hints of joy. But maybe that's more of a commentary on me than on the game.

Domino Two

Brian Murray kept the hammer down on the rebuild machine, sending Chris Kelly to Boston in exchange for a second round draft pick. By dealing another highly popular player, Murray confirms to everyone else that nobody should consider themselves safe.

Considering that again Murray didn't have to take salary back to get the trade done, and got a pick out of it, this trade is at least a short-term win for Ottawa. Longer term it does depend on the actual draft -- or whatever deal Murray puts together with this draft pick.

Personally I'm sorry to see Kelly go. I personally had him listed as "tradable but would prefer to keep". This is because Kelly is the kind of player that brings a solid, two-way game every night. When he centered the third line between Ruutu and Neil, this "energy" line would frequently be the line that could get the important goal or make the important play to bring a game back on track. However with Ruutu all but shipped out as an impending UFA, the energy line was probably doomed anyways.

Unlike Fisher, who won't be back at Scotiabank Place this year, Kelly is back here on Friday with the Bruins and since he's still in the east will be a regular visitor back here.

I would like to thank Kelly for his hard work for the team, and hope that the crowd gives him a warm reception when he comes back on Friday.

Good luck for the future, Chris, and thanks.

How Low Can You Go?

OK, hands up everybody who still thinks this team is better without Jason "No-Look" Spezza, Alexi "Enigmatic" Kovalev, or Pascal "Mr. Glass" Leclaire. Right, you lot can go sit in the hall; your coloring books and crayons will be sent out shortly.

I only watched period 2 last night, before the wife's PVR settings put the game out of my misery. But what I saw was a combination of bad luck and worse play. Bad luck in the bounces -- several times on the same play -- that led to the third goal. Bad luck in Alfredsson beating Thomas twice to ring a puck of the goal post. Bad luck in a goal going off of Gonchar's skate.

Bad play... well almost everyone else.

It was brutal.

So I was thinking: if you are a GM with a bad team, and can't make a trade, what does the result look like? I'm thinking it would look an awful lot like this team. I mean, what else can you do? Waive everybody and then gut your AHL organization? I don't think so.

I think that the test is really going to be what happens before the deadline next month. I think that Clouston will get let go at that point, even though this mess isn't his fault at all.

Lets sit back and enjoy the ride -- because I don't think we've bottomed out here yet, no sir.

Attention Boo-Birds:

Stop booing Zdeno Chara every time Boston comes to town.

There's no reason to. Ottawa made a decision to go with Wade Redden instead. Chara went somewhere he was wanted, somewhere he could grow into a leadership role.

You can't blame Chara for Redden's lack of performance.

Booing Chara makes the city look like it is populated by a bunch of ignorant hicks.

Just. Stop. Doing it. Thanks.

That said, let's again pretend the first period didn't happen on Tuesday. Letting the Boston players set up camp totally unchallenged in front of Elliot was inexcusable. The Boston players had a good, leisurely look at every incoming shot and inevitable rebound, and the resulting chaotic scramble was always going to end badly for the Senators. I don't think Elliot was totally blameless, but I think that nothing short of a miracle worker could have prevented them.

At the Boston end, their defenders kept pushing the Senators to the edges of their zone, and gave up only a few real opportunities, with Thomas being adequate to the challenge most of those times.

For the second and third periods, the Senators played tighter, but one never got the feeling that Boston was in any serious danger of being challenged.

Kovalev was one bright spot on Tuesday. While I am not a fan of this "flip the puck into the goaltender's pads" that he has been doing in response to "put the puck on the net" exhortations that everyone is fond of making, Kovalev made a few opportunities happen, one of which resulted in Kuba's goal. On a night when few Senators stepped up, Kovalev continued his improved play.

I've been waiting for the shoe to drop on this Senators team. Their run since Alfredsson's injury has been nothing short of incredible, but with Spezza gone Michalek is misfiring, and while you could say Alfredsson's leadership isn't being totally missed, it goes without saying that things would be better with him.

Things don't get any easier for this team -- Washington is next on Thursday. I'm not hopeful. Florida visits on Saturday. That one could go either way. But in the short term, things are going to get challenging for the Senators, and they need to be producing a little better effort on the ice than they did during the first on Tuesday.

(And then I watched the Juniors OT. I'm just everyone's lucky charm tonight, aren't I.)

December Scares Me

I said before the game on Saturday that I didn't expect a win. A point would be nice, although it would have to be a stolen point. With the Senators playing their third game in four nights, and their fifth in eight, it had been a long week.

Tuning in for the third period showed me I was right. Most of the guys were just plain out of gas in a way that Washington had been on Monday. Boston played a very disciplined defensive game -- the dark shirts always seemed to outnumber the white shirts in the Boston end, and they always seemed to be between the white shirts and the Boston goal.

Michalek's goal with 18 seconds to go was grand larceny in the first degree. I love this guy's speed and instincts. He's dangerous whenever he gets on the ice, no matter who the opposition is or how the game is going.

So I think the team should be grateful for their stolen point as they leave Boston.

Looking to the immediate future, December looks like this. This month features a game every second night, except when that rhythm is broken up by a back-to-back. Most of the back-to-backs involve travel, too. The only time they have two consecutive nights off is during the League shutdown on the 24th and 25th. And they close out the month with another back-to-back.

It was nice to have several long gaps in October and November, but the team will pay for that this month and next, as the schedule is compressed everywhere to allow a gap for the Olympics.

This will be a long, hard grind that could be the measure of this season for the Senators. It does look like there are more home games than away games, which is probably good for the team -- but does nothing to help the team recovered from a tired home crowd that may be suffering a little from too many games too close together.