I was stomping around my living room cursing decision-making. "It's a two-on-one and you pass to Jackman? You never pass to Jackman on a two-on-one!"
Well, shit. At least I had a reason to drink tonight all gift-wrapped for me. And then this happened:
Carlo Cokiacockvono, you are one beautiful, sick bitch. A spin-o-rama blast to tie up the game with eight seconds left that forced the OT/SO, got the Blues two points and shut that building of wine-drinking, tofu-eating, "Let's Go Shar-arks" chanters up.
The Sharks are the best team in the league. They sit atop the standings and it's easy to see why. They are talented, deep and frighteningly confident. And the Blues outplayed them virtually all night. This is what we've been waiting for. Hopefully it's what they've been waiting for too.
Some other observations from the couch:
- I like the lines the ol Coach put together for this game. The Oshie-Backes-Kariya line was great, the Boyes-McDonald-Perron line was good (though Perron was pretty absent until late), the Schnoz-Silent-Beej line was as effective as ever (I liked hearing that they took the goal against as motivation), and the Berglund-Tkachuk-Winchester line seems to be good for IceBerg, who showed us a little bit of that TechnoViking swagger that has been missing all year.
- Ty Conklin is my kind of back-up. The guy made some huge saves tonight, did everything required to win and seems to have no problem being the No. 2 guy.
- Erik Johnson is getting better every single game. What would he be like right now if that golf cart hadn't swept the knee and taken him out all of last year?
- This team played tonight like they played most of the end of last year when no one wanted to play them. They were relentless, they were physical, they were skilled and they were dangerous.
- T.J. Oshie found a new shootout move. His go-to move last year was silly, but this is the NHL and the rest of the league's goalies caught up to it. Nabokov looked positively whipped on Teej's sweet game-winner.
Saturday matinee in Los Angeles. Far as I can tell, we owe those bastards a little pay-back too. Hopefully some of that San Jose karma I mentioned pre-game is left over for some other California teams.