Sleeksays

Anaheim Ducks (14-8-3, 3rd in west) at Detroit Red Wings (15-4-4, 2nd in west) Battle of the Hangovers For today's post I threw together a comparison table looking at how the Ducks and Red Wings have been performing compared to a specific stretch of games last season. For the Ducks, the selected stretches have been hand-picked from each season: 07-08: the first 19 games after Scott Niedermayer returned to the lineup. 08-09: the most recent 19 games (excluding the 1-5-0 first six games) . I decided to stick to stretches where the Ducks have been performing well points-wise. In the 07-08 stretch, the Ducks went 12-5-2; in the 08-09 stretch the Ducks went 13-3-3. For the Red Wings, the selection is much more straightforward: 07-08: the first 23 games of the season. 08-09: the first 23 games of the season. This one's much more obvious: I'm just looking at how Detroit's "hangover" start (15-4-4) compares to its season start from last year (15-6-2) . Now I don...

As the Sharks have racked up points to start this season, I've had my attention fixed on where they'd sit after the sixteen game mark. Why sixteen games, you ask? For one, it does represent the first 20% of the season, but more importantly, it's where I mentally set the bar two years ago when the Ducks finally suffered a regulation loss in Game 17. This originally was going to be a comparison of just the 06-07 Ducks and the 08-09 Sharks, but since I started mulling the idea I've been reminded that it's not just the Ducks that started their season on fire en route to a Stanley Cup. Here's a look at the last four cup winners have performed in their (mostly) first sixteen games, with the Sharks thrown in for comparison. In the right-hand column I have included each team's record through 60 minutes -- probably more indicative of projected postseason play. Overall Records: Team Raw Record GF � GA = GD PP PK Regulation Record 03-04 Lightning * 11-2-2-1, 25 pts 0...

St. Louis Blues (5-5-0, t-10th in west) at Anaheim Ducks (8-5-1, 3rd in west) Yeah, I was yelling "Blue-urns". Well, another moderately-deserved two points snatched in L.A. last night, but I'll tell you -- the 2nd and 4th lines looked pretty outmatched through most of the night. Brendan Morrison is still struggling to produce, though I still don't mind his overall positional play, but I also think that Teemu's not fighting through enough checks, and Todd Marchant hasn't carried a scoring line since ever. But hey, today's a new day and a new opponent -- the St. Louis Blues. Fun Fact: Did you know that St. Louis is in the Central Division, home of the Detroit Red Wings? Yeah, of course you knew that, but I'm horrible at segues. But now that we're talking about Detroit, our friend, now mysteriously known as "The Swede" (though tireless research has revealed he doesn't live in Sweden ) , has produced another comic book masterpiece, thi...

Here are a few photos from last night's 4-2 Sharks win over the defending Stanley Cup champion Detroit Red Wings. After a tight checking game in the first period and several spectacular saves by backup goaltender Ty Conklin, the Sharks opened up for 3 goals in the second and outskated a tired Wings team in the third. More notes and photos from the game will be posted here soon.

The big story today seems to be the whole Todd McLellan vs. Mike Babcock sub-plot (I was going to do an Obi-Wan/Darth Vader Photoshop of the two with the "When I left you, I was but the learner. Now I am the master," line but I ran out of time) but that whole thing doesn't really mean that much to me. I mean, these guys are professionals and they knew that some day this was probably going to happen. My bigger focus is on seeing how the Sharks compare as a whole to the Wings. Like it or not, the god damn Red Wings have been the measuring stick for the league since the mid-90s (give or take a few seasons), and the emphasis is even higher now that they're defending champs. Holding Sidney Crosby and company to just a handful of shots showed that the Sharks were ready to put forth a strong defensive effort against an elite opponent, but I got the sense that the Penguins were off their game on Tuesday. I doubt I'm the only one who thought that the whole game was pretty ...

Detroit Red Wings (7-1-1, 2nd in west) at Anaheim Ducks (5-5-0, t-5th in west) Ah, it's never felt so good to be back at .500 Well, I don't know if it was a lucky mix of positivity and poetry (Poetrivity!) , but somehow the Ducks pulled off a nice 4-game sweep on their road trip, to nicely recover from their 0-4 season start. There's still plenty of things to improve on for the Ducks, but I'm still at the point that I care more that they are getting points than worrying too much about how they're getting them. Suffice to say that it was a fortunate road trip (really? only the third time ever a team has swept eastern Canada ?) , and it was extremely helpful to score the first two goals in each of the first three games. But probably the one event on the road trip that probably shouldn't be overlooked was Ryan Getzlaf's trip to the dentist . Getzlaf had a virus removed from his gum that kept him out of the game in Toronto, but apparently the virus was ad...

Damn that sucked last night. To see the Kings play such committed defense for 58 minutes and then lose it with one dimwitted pass was awful. Gauthier cemented his dipshit status last night. I felt bad for Kyle Quincey (who played like he wanted to murder everyone who didn't give him a shot in Detroit) and Drew Doughty (who looked a little overmatched but still played nicely) . And why the fuck was Ivanans playing against the Red Wings? What, the Kings have to protect Kopitar from Henrik Zetterberg or Andreas Lilja? The worst things they're going to do is fuck him and not call him again. That's damaging psychologically, not physically. (Syphillis, maybe. Hold on, I'm still building this scenario.) Oh well, it's a long season and the Kings have 6 games left on this homestand. Here's something to make you feel better: Courtesy TMZ I love how dogs in clothes are either insanely fucking happy to be wearing clothes* or unbelievably depressed. *"Holy fu...

Los Angeles Kings (3-4) vs. Detroit Red Wings (2009 Stanley Cup Champs) 7:30 PST, FSN West -Jason Labarbera is playing fucking again today. I actually like it because I wanted him to get a chance to prove himself but give Eric Ersberg a chance, huh? Did Ersberg spit on Terry Murray's grave or something? (Because he looks like a corpse, you see.) -Anze isn't looking that great to start the season. That's not bad. I've always found hockey to be cyclical: you feel great for a month, then you notice a little hitch that bothers you and it throws you off, then it seems like nothing is going right, and then all of a sudden you're fine again. The important part is that Kopitar is still being productive even though he's struggling. Both him and Frolov look like they're pressing a little bit, probably because they expected to be the leaders of this team, but they'll be fine. -Detroit is a shithole. Prediction: Kings win, 4-1, with dominant puck possess...