No He's Not Confused...

OH YEAH!!! What a game! Complete domination from beginning to end leading to the NHL's Holy Grail and it was sweet sweet pay back to those pesky Hurricanes.

The tone was set by the HABS early on in the first period with Samsonov's goal. A laser beam of a pass from our zone, and off goes Samsonov. By the time he was done with Ward, the goalie was collecting his jock strap from the third row and Sammy was gently pushing the puck in on the left side.

Williams was clearly singled out by our fourth line, and it wasn't long before he was out with a shoulder injury.

The rest of the period was spent mainly in the Canes zone. At all times the HABS had two players in the front of the net, which resulted in two more goals off of deflections on shots from the point.

Carolina came out on the second physical and aggressive after having been schooled on the first. Although this seemed to grab the HABS off guard, we adjusted. Koivu took it up on him self and dropped the gloves with Brin d'Amour and came out the clean winner. This was the end of the come back the Canes tried to stage.

In the third, one more goal deflected from the blue line my Koivu added insult to injury, and Begin delivered the Cherry on top with a sweet move to cut in towards Ward and laid one top shelf on the blocker side.

All in all it was as good as a team effort can get. We won the physical battle and won the score board 5-0. Complete domination of the Canes lead to the Heart Ross trophy, the Rocket Richard trophy and the Stanley cup. It was truly a night to remember.

Note to the reader: This game analysis refers to the final game of the Stanley Cup Finals played last night against Carolina. For 2 months I have been participating in an online league hosted on XBOX Live NHL 2K7. Two months of effort came to an end last night, and I thought I would share it since it was the HABS game with the more favourable outcome.

As far as the real (Florida) game was concerned, Huet seemed to find his confidence back, which was positive. Also the offensive explosion at the end of the third, although too little too late) was a reminder to us all what this team is capable of, which is also a positive.

I'll leave it on those good notes, except one comment I wanted to make. You have to feel sorry for Samsonov. He's going through the roughest patch of his career, he's had a shaky relationship with his current team, and now the opposition has clearance from the league to dry hump him until he comes crashing to the ice surface, without penalty. Now the guy has to drag a 200 pound guy with him while trying to find his mojo? Poor guy just can't get a break.