NBC to screw the NHL again

After last year's disasterous double booking of the NHL playoffs and the Preakness Stakes, NBC has not learned its lesson. And they have decided not to be any nicer to the NHL.

Today's game 5 of the Western Conference final between Dallas and Detroit is set for a 1:30 eastern time start. NBC has announced that, just like last year, it will switch its coverage from hockey to horseracing at 4:30, regardless of the status of the hockey game. If the game ends in regulation, there won't be a problem. If, however, the game goes to overtime like last season's Sens-Sabres game 5, NBC will pull the plug at exactly 4:30. Viewers will have to switch over to Versus. Unless they're in a hotel, which means they probably don't get Versus.

For the record, the horse race doesn't start until 6:15 eastern time. That's right. They need an hour and 45 minutes to lead into an event that will last two and a half minutes. (Refraining from obvious sex joke) They can't won't join the ridiculous pre-race coverage in progress, but they will leave what would hypothetically be an exciting game at a crucial moment.

Next season, I hope the NHL actually learns its lesson and leaves the third Saturday in May blank on the playoff schedule.

It's obvious that the reason both series took an extra day off is so both series could have a weekend afternoon (read: NBC) game. When will the league learn that this is the way NBC conducts itself? What if game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals goes past its allotted time? Will they pull the plug because Deal or No Deal needs its airtime?

I wish I was Canadian.

USA beaten by bogus goal

In IIHF action on Sunday, team USA was beaten 3-2 by Finland. The game started chippy, anded chippy, and featured a bogus goal by the Finns.

Very early in the game, Olli Jokinen delivered a crushing blow, driving Carolina Hurricanes defenseman into the boards from behind. Jokinen, who has always been regarded with disdain by RBH, was ejected from the game. Gleason was woozy but okay.

USA got off to an early 2-0 lead in the first frame, but they wouldn't score any more after that.

In the third period, the Finns got on the board with a completely bogus goal. The puck clearly entered the net by going through the right side, under the skirt. The play was reviewed, but allowed to stand. TSN has the highlights. A fuming coach John Tortarella said after the game "I'm suggesting blindness" when asked about the call.

The phantom goal wasn't the game winner. It was the first of three. Team USA still has a very valid complaint about the goal, though.

As the game ended, there was a nasty bench clearing brawl that resulted in several ejections and suspensions.

For Today's Finland-Canada game, Finland will be without Jokinen because of the boarding incident. Anssi Salmela, who was pummeled in the fight, will also serve a suspension.

USA takes on Norway for the right to advance to the elimination round. USA will be without David Backes because of his role in the brawl.

According to the IIHF, they have acknowledged that the phantom goal should not have counted. The video judge has been suspended for the remainder of the tournament.

Montréal fans gone wild

On Monday night, the Montréal Canadiens defeated the Boston Bruins 5-0 to win the eastern conference quarterfinal series four games to three.

Boston put up way more of a fight than anyone expected, but they just didn't have enough in the tank. In most NHL cities, the fans are slightly jubilant when their heavily favored team wins a first round series against a big underdog.

In some cities, the fans spill out into the streets till the wee hours of the morning. Most of those celebrations are reserved for conference championships and of course the Stanley Cup championship.

In Montréal last night, there was utter chaos. And not in a good way:


This is absolutely disgusting. People setting cop cars on fire and smashing things is never acceptable, and winning the eastern conference quarterfinals is no excuse for the way those "fans" behaved. Les Habitants have won 23 Stanley Cups, and you would think that in 99 years they would have learned to take a first round series victory in stride. Apparently, you would think wrong.

Obviously, the hundreds of people responsible for the ugly scene last night are not representative of the Hab nation as a whole, but it's pretty ugly. If I were a citizen of Montreéal, I would be a little embarrassed and a little frightened right now.

If this is how people behaved after a win, I wonder how they would have behaved if Boston had won game seven.

Ed Belfour is a toolbag (v 6.11)

As if we needed anything else as evidence of Ed Belfour's character, the Miami Herald has reported that Belfour has been arrested again. Essentially, he refused to leave a nightclub after he had been cut off and kicked out. When police arrived, he still refused to leave. When he was placed under arrest, he resisted.

It sounds stunningly like the incident in Dallas in 1999. There is no word on how much money Belfour offered the Miami police, but he reportedly offered officers in Dallas "One billion dollars" not to arrest him.

This time, Belfour had to be subdued with a taser after he approached officers "in a fighting stance" and refused orders to place his hands behind his back.

The full police report is viewable here

Carolina wins meaningless game, Olli Jokinen writes a check his ass can't cash

Last Sunday, after Carolina snatched victory from the Panthers, many of the players angrily accused Carolina of being divers. It was the second time in a row that Carolina won a game against Florida on a power play goal in overtime.

Among other things, Jokinen told the Miami Herald that in order for the Panthers to beat Carolina they would

``have to play within the rules, and sign five or six guys who can dive every time you touch them.''

Then he went on to say that they wouldn't let it happen again. At the time, Carolina still had a chance to make the playoffs. The Panthers were ruled out and he at least wanted to spoil Carolina. He stopped short of using the words "Guarantee" and "Win", but that's pretty much what he was doing when he said:

'We have to make sure . . . they don't make the playoffs,'' Jokinen said. ``We have to get two points out of there.

``This team has stolen so many points from us, we have to win that last game and make sure they don't go anywhere. I'd rather see Tampa and Atlanta make it than this team.''

So anyway, among the silver linings that can be found in missing the playoffs, there's this:


Carolina overcame a 4-1 third period defecit to force overtime against the Cats. Carolina got regulation goals from Eric Staal, Erik Cole and two from David Tanabe. Florida got their goals from Ville Peltonen, Olli Jokinen, Jay Bouwmeester and Marty Gelinas.

Early in the overtime period, Bryan Allen was called for kneeing, which gave the Canes a man advantage. It was Allen's hook on Sunday that made Belfour lose his composure, which gave the Canes the two man advantage. I don't know about the kneeing call, but Carolina couldn't convert. In fact, Allen had a chance to wipe it all away when he was awarded a penalty shot just after coming out of the box. He missed his chance, though. As time wound down in regulation, Allen found a way to be the goat anyway. He turned the puck over to Rod Brind'Amour in neutral ice, and the Captain cashed in on the breakaway gift.

Unfortunately, Ed Belfour wasn't in nets for the Panthers.

More stuff about the game, including pictures later.

Canes whip Bruins -- gameday commentary.

On Saturday night, the Canes played about 50 minutes of good hockey, and fortunately 50 was all it took to defeat the visiting Bruins 5-2. Bruins netminder Tim Thomas would complain after the game that the Canes were running up the score. More on that later.

Throughout the game, we were shown out-of-town scores, just like usual. Because of the busy day in college football, with all of the conference championship games, there was a lot of that, too. A roar came out when we saw that UCLA had stunned #2 USC. A big roar came up when we saw that Wake Forest had won the ACC championship game and will be going to the Rose Bowl. The biggest roar of approval, though, came when the NHL scores were posted, and we saw that the Caps were busy beating the Sabres. Even though it's in our interest to see the Caps (a divisional opponent) lose, we're always happy to see the Sabres lose. Personally, I don't have much against the Sabres. I have a few friends who are Sabres fans, and I've been known to pull for the Crossed Swords Sabres on their behalf. Still, part of me hates them. And I think it's safe to say that a vast majority of the Caniac Nation would root for Al-Qaeda sooner than they'd do the same for the Sabres.

With that, the perfect opportunity to link to my favorite Onion article ever. Every time I read this, it makes me cry with laughter.

After the Canes took a nap in the latter portion of the first period, they looked much sharper in the second and third. They ended up winning 5-2, putting an end to the Bruins three-game winning streak. Before that little streak, the Bruins lost to the Canes on the day after Thanksgiving 5-1. In that game, Tim Thomas was chased from the nets after three goals. He would get no relief this time, picking up his second loss to the Canes in eight days. On Saturday, he stopped 25 of 30 Canes shots (.833) and was out of position all night long. While it's true that he didn't get a lot of blue line assistance, he was giving up big rebounds and got out of position a lot.

After the game, Thomas complained about the Canes padding their stats.

"They're a point-hungry team," Thomas said. "I'm not talking about points for the win. The end of the game there, they were all doing a little bit of cheating to get their point totals up, so they can get a bigger contract next time."

What?? Seriously? I don't see how in the world there can be any stats padding in a 5-2 game. At 4-2, the game is still in question, and the fifth goal was scored at 11:24. The TOI stats are pretty evenly balanced up and down the forward lines, so it wasn't a matter of keeping the big dogs out there longer.
This isn't some high school football game where one team is up 74-0 and still using their star running back. The last time I checked, this is the NHL, and a 4-2 lead isn't safe in the new NHL. Padding stats? Yeah, they really poured it on by scoring an insurance marker with 9 minutes to play.

Idiot.


Game update is in the works.