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NHL STANLEY CUP FINALS LIVE THREAD!!!
nhl.com ^ | 5/23/08 | var

Posted on 05/23/2008 3:54:38 PM PDT by airborne

Congratulations to the Detroit Red Wings and the Pittsburgh Penguins!

Two great teams who have earned the chance to hoist Lord Stanley's Cup!

There are a multitude of stories on the NHL website - http://www.nhl.com/

And on the Red Wings website - http://redwings.nhl.com/

And on the Penguins website - http://penguins.nhl.com/

This promises to be one of the greatest series in NHL history! Something for those who don't usually watch!

So spread the word, and do your part to recruit a new fan or two!


TOPICS: Chit/Chat; Miscellaneous; Sports
KEYWORDS: crosbysoverrated; hockey; nhlfinals; penguins; redwings
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To: dcam
These threads are all about trash talk.

You're not bragging about that, are you?

141 posted on 05/28/2008 8:27:16 PM PDT by Petronski (Scripture & Tradition must be accepted & honored w/equal sentiments of devotion & reverence. CCC 82)
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To: Petronski

Of course!


142 posted on 05/28/2008 8:28:38 PM PDT by rivercat (The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers. - William Shakespeare)
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To: SoothingDave

Exciting game tonight. Were you able to see it? I was happy to see our former Predator Adam Hall get his first goal and a gamewinner at that!


143 posted on 05/28/2008 8:28:45 PM PDT by secret garden (Dubiety reigns here)
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To: dcam

Yer funney DCAM.


144 posted on 05/28/2008 8:31:56 PM PDT by shove_it (and have a nice day)
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To: secret garden

See it? No.

Listen to it? Yes.

Nothing worse than a sore loser who can’t even recognize he lost.

I’m feeling fine.


145 posted on 05/28/2008 8:32:14 PM PDT by SoothingDave
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To: SoothingDave
"If you see Kay, tell her that she's for you"

Wow! I haven't heard that one since grade school in Detroit in the '50s. Are you sure you're not from Detroit? It's late ... I go bed now.

146 posted on 05/28/2008 8:43:04 PM PDT by shove_it (and have a nice day)
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To: SoothingDave

I hope you are in the process of ordering that slingbox. You would’ve loved this one. They played with such high energy. Holmstrom had his helmet knocked off for half the game and unfortunately took a bad hit near the end and didn’t come back to play. It looked painful.


147 posted on 05/28/2008 8:44:41 PM PDT by secret garden (Dubiety reigns here)
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To: shove_it

I know it as a song from April Wine heard on the middle school bus.

See, it’s nice to sometimes not be obnoxious. :-)


148 posted on 05/28/2008 9:03:46 PM PDT by SoothingDave
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To: dcam

Yes I was very pleased to see it. The Red Wings still looked like the superior team, but the Penguins did turn it up a notch. That long stretch of continuous play in the 3rd period was the epitome of exciting playoff hockey. Criswell predicts: 3-1 Red Wings after game 4.


149 posted on 05/28/2008 11:18:39 PM PDT by dr_lew
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To: shove_it

A little under the weather.

Great game last night.

It looks like it might be a good series after all.


150 posted on 05/29/2008 4:19:58 AM PDT by airborne (LETS GO PENS!!! LETS GO PENS!!! LETS GO PENS!!! WOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!)
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To: airborne; fanfan

To tide fans over until Saturday night, here’s a great Andrew Coyne piece from 2 years ago!

http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=ecc9a07a-659f-4169-9ba9-3d1154b280ca

“Why hockey rules
... And other sports suck”

....There is one game that stands out as objectively, scientifically, mathematically superior to the rest. I am of course talking about “the best game you can name,” le sport des glorieux, the gentlemanly sport of hockey. Let’s break it down by category.

The game. There is more action in five minutes of hockey than in your average 90-minute game of soccer, whose fans live for the moment when, by some mischance, the ball strays within 50 yards of the net. Basketball suffers from the opposite affliction: As the comedian David Brenner argues, they should start both teams at 100 and make the games two minutes long, since that’s what every basketball game comes down to. Only hockey combines frequency of scoring chances with difficulty of actually scoring: Fans, especially at playoff time, are kept in a state of near-permanent hysteria, the prospect of a game-altering goal ever present.

Hockey is fluid, where baseball and football are static. It has been calculated that a 60-minute football game, though it takes nearly three hours to complete, adds up to no more than about 10 minutes of actual playing time. The rest is huddles, signal-calling, etc. Baseball players spend half of every game sitting around on the bench, chewing tobacco. The rest is spent standing around in the field, chewing tobacco. But oh, the geometry.

“The beautiful game?” I’ll tell you what’s beautiful: a perfectly timed hip check at mid-ice, sending the other player cartwheeling onto his head. It’s ice dancing, only with more bruises and fewer sequins.

The championship. There is no greater test of endurance in sports than the Stanley Cup playoffs — four consecutive best-of-seven series, as many as 28 games, each one an all-out war. To be crowned NFL champion, you have to win at most four games, total: about 20 minutes work for the average team member, offensive or defensive, less for those assigned to the risible “specialty teams.”

Baseball players go through a similar process to reach the top, but, well, it’s baseball — how hard can it be? Basketball? I don’t see any playoff beards on those pampered egomaniacs. The only thing I can think of that comes close is the Tour de France — if there were hip checks.

There’s also the matter of the cup itself.

The Stanley Cup, I have observed, is the object of some considerable fascination, even reverence, among Americans. You can see why: It’s the oldest of the major sports trophies, and the classiest. It’s not the Burger King Stanley Cup, after all. You’re looking for a trophy for your major-league sporting event? Ask yourself these questions. Can you remember its name? (I don’t even know what they give the NBA winners.) Can you drink champagne out of it? Does it have engraved upon it the names of every team and every player to ever win it?
...The culture. One of the oddities of soccer is how light the penalties are. You trip a guy as he’s about to kick the ball, and ... he gets to kick it again. If it’s a particularly flagrant foul, the referee might show you a yellow card. You trip a guy in hockey, and you lose 20% of your skating manpower for two minutes or more.

But then it hit me: It’s a matter of incentives. Soccer has a serious problem as it is with players taking dives in hopes of being awarded a free kick. Imagine the operas of agony they would perform if the penalties were more severe.

Diving is not unknown in hockey, and may be getting worse, but it’s still frowned upon. It’s not — yet — part of the culture of the game, the way it is in soccer. There’s still an honest, workaday quality to hockey, even as played by millionaires. Of course, what I really mean is: It’s Canadian. Everyone’s moaning about American teams winning the Stanley Cup, Americans taking over our game. I prefer to think of it as an example of reverse cultural colonialism, a little piece of Canadian culture that has conquered the hearts of millions of Americans.

Mind you, there is one area where hockey falls short: colourful nicknames. There is no hockey equivalent to baseball’s “Oil Can” Boyd or “Catfish” Hunter. Hockey nicknames are formed in one of two ways: by dropping the last syllable of the player’s name, or by adding -er or -ie (sometimes by a combination of the two).

There’s a simple reason for this: exhaustion
It’s all a hockey player can do to gasp out “go Wayner” or “attaboy, Mess” between shifts. Baseball players, on the other hand, have all the time in the world.

;^)

Let’s hope Pittsburgh keeps it up Saturday!

Go, Pens


151 posted on 05/29/2008 12:54:48 PM PDT by headsonpikes (Genocide is the highest sacrament of socialism.)
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To: headsonpikes

A great read!

Thanks!


152 posted on 05/29/2008 1:19:35 PM PDT by airborne (LETS GO PENS!!! LETS GO PENS!!! LETS GO PENS!!! WOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!)
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To: dr_lew
That long stretch of continuous play in the 3rd period was the epitome of exciting playoff hockey.

Boy, you can say that again. That might have been the most exciting five minutes of hockey I have ever seen, and I have followed the sport for over 40 years now.

153 posted on 05/29/2008 1:27:58 PM PDT by Ditto (Global Warming: The 21st Century's Snake Oil)
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To: headsonpikes

Lacrosse is equally exciting.

Go Wings!


154 posted on 05/29/2008 4:55:51 PM PDT by rivercat (The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers. - William Shakespeare)
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To: airborne
Here's hoping you're feeling better. For an impartial opinion of the game, go here.
155 posted on 05/30/2008 11:35:18 AM PDT by shove_it (and have a nice day)
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To: headsonpikes
An old fraternity brother of mine characterized hockey as “the fastest game on ice”. Obviously he did not appreciate the finer points of the game. The bravado of the players is IMHO the most compelling aspect of the game. In what other sport does a player limp off the ice after being slammed by an opponent into the boards with blood gushing from his face, get 20 odd stitches in the locker room and return to the action a few minutes later? It's the closest thing in organized sport to assault with a deadly weapon.

Thanks for posting the Coyne article.

156 posted on 05/30/2008 12:09:25 PM PDT by shove_it (and have a nice day)
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To: airborne
I am going nuts here. Two good periods of hockey.

We gotta have this one.

157 posted on 05/31/2008 6:56:36 PM PDT by AGreatPer (The Pens will come back. (they have, almost))
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To: AGreatPer

Bump what you said!


158 posted on 05/31/2008 7:06:27 PM PDT by PA Engineer (Liberate America from the occupation media.)
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To: PA Engineer

Not good. Lucky goal, 2-1 Detroit. Hey, that’s the way it goes. Lots of time remaining.


159 posted on 05/31/2008 7:14:39 PM PDT by AGreatPer (The Pens will come back. (they have, almost))
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To: AGreatPer

Ah, hell. Great game. Heck of a hockey team. Congrats to Detroit. If the Pens can’t turn a 2 man advantage into something when they desperately needed it, on home ice, that says a lot about the Wings.


160 posted on 05/31/2008 7:50:46 PM PDT by SoothingDave
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