Tomorrow there will be more on my trip to Toronto. Today there will be celebration, as the Rangers overcame exhaustion, referees who clearly favor cities closer to Canada, and the excellent goaltending of Ryan Miller to vanquish the Sabres 2-1 and bring the series to 2 games to 1. The Rangers are alive and well and living on Broadway (well, 7th Avenue, but its close down there).
If there is no winner after three periods in a playoff hockey game, the rules are much different than during the regular season. In the regular season, there is a one minute break, then a five minute, four on four, sudden death overtime, and finally a shootout. After about 25 minutes at the most, you are usually out of there. Playoff hockey is more like baseball. It may never end.
There is a 15 minute intermission between the third and fourth periods, and a full 20 minute period is scheduled. There are the usual 5 men plus a goalie for each team on the ice. The only difference is sudden death: the first team to score wins. If no one scores, the process is repeated until someone does. The longest game ever played had six overtime periods and had 176 1/2 minutes of game play. To put that in perspective, with only two overtime periods, we were all mentally and physically exhausted at the end of the game.
After a scoreless first period, the Rangers managed to score on an ugly goal by Jagr. They looked like they scored a second goal as well, but it was overruled by the television referees in Toronto. The Sabres tied it up in the third with a goal by Daniel Briere on one of Buffalo's nine power plays. Although the Rangers were clearly fouling, it is my opinion that the referees clearly deserved the shouts of "A&^H&#e" that they routinely were getting from the stands. By the second overtime period, all of the players looked exhausted. You got the feeling that someone would make a mistake: it was just a matter of time. The mistake was made by Miller and his defense: they allowed a 53 foot slapshot from Rozsival to get through, ending the game. Kudos must also go out to Lundqvist, the number one star of the game, for saving 38 of 39 shots on goal.
We await Tuesday!!!!
PS: I saw some guys who had "Section 314" t-shirts made. I am jealous!
2 comments:
nice seats!
let's go celebrate with lunch here, from NY Mag:
Resto’s Tête de Cochon Is Our Sandwich of the Week
Head, if not shoulders, above the rest.
It’s a sad fact of life that some of the best things to eat in restaurants never make it out of the kitchen and onto the Underground Gourmet’s plate. We’re talking about staff or “family” meals, of course, those rustic snacks that kitchen crews deem unfit for mass consumption but then greedily hoard behind kitchen doors like hungry wolves around a fresh carcass. Happily, that was not the fate of one of the best sandwiches the UG has ever sunk his teeth into, the tête de cochon at the new Belgian restaurant Resto.
Resto’s executive chef Ryan Skeen developed this exceptional sandwich last fall while helping his friend Daniel Humm at Eleven Madison Park as Skeen waited for Resto to open. As every pork freak in town can tell you, Humm is known for his delectable suckling pig confit, and Skeen found himself up to his eyeballs in it: “They were doing baby pig all the time,” he says, “and they were just tossing the heads and I was like, ‘Daniel, this is crazy, man, let me just play with these for family meal at least.’” Play he did, and the inspired result was something like a cross between a bánh mì, a BLT, and a St. Louis pig snoot sandwich — crisp and succulent bits of curry-braised pig’s-head brushed with a mix of maple syrup and Banyuls vinegar and served with pickled veggies and homemade mayo on toasted brioche. Although this deliriously good concoction never made it into the dining room at Eleven Madison, Skeen decided to take pity on the pig-noggin-loving public and serve it on Resto’s late-night menu. In-the-know early birds can get it too; they need only ask, says Skeen — or give the secret Pig-Head Eater’s Anonymous handshake. —Rob Patronite & Robin Raisfeld
Resto, 111 E. 29th St., nr. Park Ave. S.; 212-685-5585.
Hello all,
I'm writing to tell you about a new Stanley Cup blog for fans of teams who have qualified for the playoffs (Suk it, Leafs!).
Battle for the Cup
http://battleforthecup.blogspot.com
The aim is, from this year forth, to provide the fans of teams a neutral setting to verbally battle fans of new rival teams as the playoffs progress. Your site came up near the top of a search for blogs about your team. We'd appreciate if you linked to our site and promoted liveblogging here. We'll link back to yours so long as your team remains in the playoffs - when your team gets eliminated, so does your link =)
We're also looking for persons willing to provide game-day postings to serve as the seed for game-time commenting. If you have quality writing capabilities, we'd appreciate hearing from you at mork.from.ork.78(chez)gmail.com. Essentially, you just need to write a brief pre-game synopsis that stirs up fans of both teams (strong bias is more than welcome!).
This may take a few days to get some real activity going as it's late in the playoffs, but this year will serve as a good foundation for next year.
Thanks, and please enjoy tormenting your rival fans.
"THM"
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