Red Bulls on the Wings of Angel
6. June 2008 by critter.
Last night the Red Bulls snapped out of a downward spiral and defeated Chivas USA by a score of 1 - 0. In a shortened week coming off of last Saturday’s loss to Houston, the Red Bulls were hit hard twice in news that regular captain Claudio Reyna was diagnosed with a herniated disc and the stunning news that the team has set up to transfer the all star 18 year old, Jozy Altidore to Villareal of the Spanish La Liga.
Missing two of their biggest stars, even though Reyna has been slow thus far this year, the Red Bulls still put up a great match on defense. Neither team was really able to get through with many scoring opportunities, but Chivas was able to get more shots and pressure throughout most of the game.
It all came down to a simple cross from Dane Richards that acting captain and one of the now lonely stars on the team, Juan Pablo Angel, was able to break through and head into the far corner of the net. Chivas went on a huge attack from that point but Jon Conway was stellar and steered the rest of the match to his third shutout this year.
In the closing minutes of the match Dane Richards was escorted off the field after twisting his ankle the wrong way trying to redirect a kick. Almost at that exact moment, Juan Pablo Angel pulled up short and injured his leg as well. Dane Richards being unable to stand got the substitution and Angel was stuck limping across the field for another couple of minutes. Luckily the Red Bulls have a long rest until their next match on June 14th.
Detroit Rock Pitty!
6. June 2008 by critter.
And so ends the NHL season as the Detroit Red Wings proved to be just way too much for the Pittsburgh Penguins. After the marathon game that took place less than 2 days prior, the youthful Penguins just seemed way too tired and couldn’t get any offense going. As per the playoff norm, the Wings came out attacking hard, giving the Penguins no breathing space.
The most the Pens could do was dump the puck into the offensive zone, but it would be taken right back out within seconds. They couldn’t set up any offense in the zone, nor could they get close in on Chris Osgood. Detroit took a 3 - 1 lead with a fluke goal that Marc Andre Fleury initially stopped. The puck slipped behind him and just laid flat on the ice uncontrolled. Fleury thought he had the puck, but the ref didn’t blow the whistle, so after a couple of seconds Fleury leaned back to cover the puck but wound up knocking it backwards and into the net.
Deep into the third period the Penguins still trailed by 2 goals and the Red Wings hadn’t allowed a single shot nearly 12 minutes into the period. The game was slow for the Pens and rather boring as you could feel the experienced Wings squeezing the life out of them.
But it wasn’t over….with 2 minutes left the game finally got interesting. On a powerplay, the Pens pulled their goalie to have a 2 man advantage. Sergei Gonchar ripped a shot from the top of the zone that got redirected just over Osgood’s shoulder and cut the deficit to a single goal. The Pens then kept Fleury on the bench for the single extra attacker. They had a pretty tight couple of attacks but Detroit kept clearing the zone. Then with about 10 seconds left the puck slipped through with the Pens pretty much on a 2 on 1 attack. A blast was let on net and Chris Osgood made one final great save but let the puck trickle out of his reach. With literally 1 second remaining, Marian Hossa flailed his stick out as the trailing man on the attack and got a piece of the puck… .2 seconds …… and the final .2 seconds showed the puck literally glide through the goal crease no more than 2 inches from the goal line.
And with that, the Wings had their 4th Stanley Cup title in 11 seasons. In the past 14 years, I’d say there have been 2 true franchises. The Devils who are done with at this point and the Red Wings who’ve made something like 17 straight playoff appearances and now 4 titles. The title stays with the Western Conference for another year, and more importantly it stays with a US team once again. My solace in the whole thing was that Pittsburgh’s final great moment of the season was a 3rd OT goal that was predicted and delivered by my favorite player, Petr Sykora.
Now I can start up the chant of “Rangers in ‘09″ but first their goofy asses need to resign Sean Avery for big $$, let Jagr go to another team that will pay him too much money to hang around center ice, and with that money bring someone in who can really dictate a powerplay….. and oh yeah there’s that little point of me being dead on again with predicting the Red Wings in 6….damn I’m good!
