Fourth row of teeth apparently deadliest

On By mpetrella
Serven thought it might be nice to go with Playmate of the Year from the good ol’ years. I present to you, Playmate of the Year 1997: Victoria Silvstedt. BONUS: She’s Swedish. So, there’s that.



FINAL SCORE
3-2 Sharks, in a shootout [1-0 in the shootout]

TPL’S TAKE
Oh noes! The Red Wings are taking a page out of the Rangers book (which, by the way, is never a good idea) and have computer-generated advertisements digitally projected onto the glass (visible on the broadcast only)behind the nets. Being a selective hockey traditionalist (I’ll explain some other time), I dislike it. CaptNorris5 made a decent point on Twitter, saying that he’d rather have them there than on team sweaters. Touche. I would hate them on sweaters even more, but it makes me wonder if they weren’t strapped for cash the first 59 games. Why start now? Random.

Jimmy Howard’s first few minutes were pretty great. In the first minute, there was scramble at the Wings goal mouth, and I have absolutely no idea how Jimmy Howard A) kept the puck out, after showing quite a bit of daylight and B) flung it out of the crease behind him. It was a very odd play, but he kept it out — whatever. A few minutes later, on the Sharks first power play, Howard made another great save, kept it knotted at zeros. Ya know… momentarily.
Derek Meech missed a wide open net on a delayed Sharks penalty. Fitting in its awkwardness. On the ensuing power player, Johan Franzen nets one off of Nabokov’s glove. Frankly, Mulo has no business scoring from there, but we’ll take ’em anyway we can get ’em. 
Seconds later (literally…35 seconds later), the Sharks tied the game back up. Hey, have you heard about how springy the boards at Joe Louis Arena are? Well, Jimmy’s still learning, and a dump bounced off the rear boards and found its way back to the crease, where big dumbass monkey Joe Thornton was waiting to tap it in. 
Play of the game: Tomas Holmstrom, clearly tired of Darren Helm getting all the babes with his speed, beats out an icing call. For real? For real. I demand a footrace. Settle this thing once and for all. 
Ten seconds left in the first period, the Wings allow the Sharks to take a 2-1 lead. No one could do anything about the goal. Oh, except for Jonathan Ericsson who was sightseeing near the goal line, and then did absolutely nothing except wave at big-time goal scorer Dwight Helminen. I caught a lot of slack in the WIM thread, but I think that Jonathan Ericsson is the weak link on defense. And this is a defense that includes Derek Meech and Brett Lebda. I’ve made it clear that I wasn’t enamored with him, even in the playoffs when everyone else seemed to think he was the second coming, and he’s done very little except suck ass all year. I think Andy may be on to something when he suggests that Ericsson is making it clear to anyone that watches that he’s a natural forward — and the conversion to defense has failed. 
Ken Daniels said what we already knew, passing along a message from Ken Holland: the Red Wings will make a roster move tomorrow to accommodate the addition of Andreas Lilja to the active roster. More on that in a second…
…but kind of in the same vein, Jason Williams spent the night upping his trade value. A great night for Willi Vanilli, his goal was special. A fantastic toe-drag turned into a perfectly placed snapshot. For good measure, they reviewed the goal (why not?!), but it would stand. 2-2, Wings applying good pressure…what could possibly go wrong?
Jonathan Ericsson attempted to find some redemption, as he fought Ryan Clowe late in the third. It didn’t end as Rig would have liked, but he got a beautiful chin shot in right after the gloves hit the ice. If Ryan Clowe is anything like Andreas Lilja, he’ll miss the next 102 Sharks games.
Oh good, overtime.
Oh good, a power play in overtime.
Oh good, a shootout. 
Oh good, Todd Bertuzzi.
Oh good, the fourth loss in a row. And 11th loss in the last 14 games. The Sharks won as many games against the Wings this season as there are watchable Jaws films: “one, but barely.”
EXTRA EXTRA!
After seeing Chris McCosky’s piece about how many scouts from other teams were in attendance tonight, I figured that the Red Wings would be showcasing Brett Lebda and/or Jason Williams and/or someone else. I thought it might be fun to analyze time on ice in the Sharks game vs. their season averages. Obviously, with the overtime, some numbers are expected to be skewed. Some names that have come up at least once in the last few weeks:
Jason Williams :: 13:48 tonight :: averages 14:22 :: Down 0:34
Brett Lebda :: 15:57 tonight :: averages 15:14 :: Down 0:43
Todd Bertuzzi :: 15:27 tonight :: averages 17:10 :: Down 1:43
Derek Meech :: 8:08 tonight :: averages 13:03 :: Down 4:55
Jonathan Ericsson :: 17:31 tonight :: averages 17:45 :: Down 0:14
So…. I got nothin’. The only players who played more than their average were Johan Franzen (up 1:53), Henrik Zetterberg (up 4:01), Nick Lidstrom (up 6:28), Pavel Datsyuk (up 4:42), Valtteri Filppula (up 1:22), and Brian Rafalski (up 2:21). And that’s probably due to the close game and overtime, since they’re not going anywhere.

1. Homer :: played a pretty good game. Not as visible as Franzen, in his second game back.
2. Sweeping the Sharks :: didn’t happen, but it was close.
3. Roster change :: all of a sudden, I bet Holland’s phone rings for Willi Vanilli
4. Zetterberg/Datsyuk/Bertuzzi :: the first two had assists. The latter fell down a lot.
5. Hollis :: Happy Birthday anyway, brother.
6. TTD :: Happy Blogday.

What’s next?
Ottawa Saturday. It’s the final game before the Olympic break.