Luck O'The Irish Sports Chowdah Update- B's Working Overtime; C;s Pick Up the Pace; Madness Begins; NFL Lockout Looming?

It's been awhile since I've done one of these, huh? Well, not too surprisingly, events elsewhere had caught my undivided attention and no matter how much I love my teams, I didn't give sports that high a priority in the grand scheme of things. NHL: Coming off their come-from-behind shootout win against the Columbus Blue Jackets on Tuesday with Tukka Rask 'twixt the pipes, the Bruins travelled to Music City on Thursday night to take on the Nashville Predators.

The Bruins got on the board first with a tally from Tyler Seguin in the first, but Nashville (presently 3rd in the Central Division and on the outside looking in for the 8th and final playoff spot for the Western conference) would come right back to tie it thanks to a Sergei Kostitsyn before taking a 2-1 lead on a Colin Wilson tally early in the 2nd. A David Krejci goal made it a 2-2 game heading to the 2nd intermission and Patrice Bergeron was able to get one past Preds netminder Pekka Renne not even 2 minutes into the 3rd to make it a 3-2 Boston lead.

However, Boston would be unable to hold onto the lead and at around the 10 minute mark, David Legwand was able to beat Tukka Rask to tie the game up at 3 and force overtime. At the 3 minute mark in OT, Nashville would get the power play on a holding minor on Steve Kampfer, where Shea Weber would capitalize and get the game winning tally in sudden death OT. The 4-3 OT win means that Nashville manages to stay within 1 point of the Calgary Flames and 2 points of the Dallas Stars and Chicago Blackhawks (both Dallas and Calgary won tonight as well).

After making 34 saves (and stopping all 3 shootout shots faced) on Tuedsay against the Blue Jackets, Rask made 27 saves on Thursday night while Nashville's Pekka Renne stopped 35 of 38 shots faced on the night.

The Bruins have gone 5-2-3 in their last 10 games and 1-2-3 since their 6 game winning streak was snapped earlier this month. Their next game will take place in Toronto against the Leafs and will be televised on NESN and CBC's Hockey Night in Canada (and presumably the NHL network in the USA by extension) at 7PM Eastern time. I have to say, I'm supremely disappointed in the Nashville Predators (AKA Mr. Carrie Underwood's team) and their management for not following through on my concept of casting a wide net of aspiring hottie country music starlets in order to lure marginally talented and competent bloggers to Nashville. I mean if that was in fact the means with which they were attracting NHL talent to the Music City, it would stand to reason that bloggers with way too much time on their hands would be next, right?

OTHER NHL NEWS: The league had decided not to suspend Zdeno Chara after a hit against Max Pacioretty left the Montreal winger with a concussion and fractured vertebrae. NHL senior vice president of operations Colin Campbell- who usually hands down supplemental punishments for controversial hits like Chara's- had to recuse himself from any decision because his son Gregory Campbell and Chara are teammates. NHL executive Mike Murphy had decided not to suspend or fine Chara after reviewing video of the hit- Chara was given a major penalty and game misconduct in the 4-1 loss to Montreal last week.

MLB: Red Sox pitchers Daisuke Matsuzaka and Hideki Okajima have been in contact with their families back in Japan since last week's massive earthquake and deadly tsunamis. Their immediate families are with them in the states, while Matsuzaka's parents presently reside in the Tokyo area, some 200 miles south of the epicenter from last week's quake. Most of Hideki Okajima's family lives in the southern Kyodo reigon of Japan.

The two pitchers appeared in a videotaped appeal for donations towards the relief efforts in Japan that will be made via the Red Sox foundation. Along with Matsuzaka and Okajima, pitchers Junichi Tazawa and Itsuki Shoda collected donations from fans arriving at the home plate entrance of City of Palms park before the Monday night game against the NY Yankees.

NBA: The Celtics have hit something of a rough patch over the last week or so, dropping three out of their last 5 including games against the Clippers, Nets and 76ers. However, they were able to pick up a W at the Garden in Wednesday night's game against the Indiana Pacers. Acquired from the Oklahoma City Thunder, F Jeff Green came off the bench for Boston with 19 points and 3 rebounds, while Paul Pierce led the scoring for the starters with 20 points.

Although they trailed in the first quarter, the Celtics managed to get by the Pacers by a final of 90-82. Their next game is on Friday night at Houston- the game gets underway at 8:30 ET

NFL: You know what? Back when they were still playing, I thought any talk of a lockout was outlandish and farfetched. I mean surely the owners, league and players wouldn't be so tone-deaf to think that in this epoch of soaring food or fuel costs, record home foreclosures and high unemployment that some highly publicized melodrama between multimillionaires and billionaires would capture the public's attention or sympathy, would they?

Well- turns out I was wrong. Now it's too early to write off the 2011 season entirely, but all indications are that players and management are still miles apart when it comes to any sort of labor agreement.

NCAA HOOPS: OK, so my bracket-fu ranges from weak to nonexistent.

With that said, New England will be represented by a couple of teams as March Madness gets underway. To hardly anybody's surprise, the UConn Huskies handled Bucknell pretty easily, winning by a final of 81-52 on Thursday. The win sets up a meeting with another Big East team- the Cincinnati Bearcats on Saturday the 19th.

The BU Terriers will have something of an uphill battle on Friday when they're scheduled to take on the #1 seed Kansas Jayhawks at the BOK Center in Oklahoma City at 6:50 PM ET

Hot and Cold Sports Chowdah Update- Black and Bleu at the Garden; Lakers Drain Celtics; Stirring the Beanpot

Two Boston sports institutions going up against arch rivals in the regular season, but with buzz- both before and after- more reminiscent of the postseason.

Did I already mention how fortunate I consider myself to be a New England sports fan at this point in history?

The undercard

NHL: If there was only one B's game to be nationally broadcast this whole season, Wednesday night's home game against arch rival Montreal would've been the one.
Apparently last week's game against Dallas was just a warm-up. Nothing like some Original 6 brawling- and not just figuratively- to get the blood going, huh?

With Montreal starting to close the gap in the Northeast division, the folks over at VS network thought Wendesday night's game was important enough to be boradcast on their network coast-to-coast (even though they were just carrying the TSN feed).

And man oh man was I glad I was able to tune in.

A good chunk of the first period seemed to feature the Bruins spending a disproportionate amount of time in Montreal's end of the ice, but with Montreal getting the better shots on goal (however infrequent). My perceptions changed somewhat after the 13 minute mark in the 1st when Brad Marchand and Dennis Seidenberg each scored 22 seconds apart (Seidenberg's tally coming off of a high bounce that the Montreal defener tried to corrall by swatting at with a stick). So Boston heads into the 1st intermission with a 2-0 lead.

Now on most nights, you'd be in pretty good shape if you could manage to get two by Montreal's Carey Price- especially if your own backstop is shutting them out. Not so on Wednesday night. The following video clips say it much better than I could-


For those of you who want to jump straight into the fisticuffs, hockeyfights.com was thoughtful enough to archive the melee towards the very end of the 3rd.


Most teams have every reason to expect to come out on top in a contest where they get six past Tim Thomas, but not Wednesday night. Both teams combined for 14 goals and 182 penalty minutes- nearly twice what was assessed in last week's game vs Dallas. As you can see from the video evidence, it's no exaggeration when I say that Boston absolutely beat the Habs down by a final of 8-5. The brawl at the end was simply the exclamation point.

The save percentages of both Price and Thomas also took a beating, with the Montreal backstop stopping 26 of 34 shots faces and Thomas stopping 27 of 33 shots faced. Micheal Ryder had two goals (one of them on the power play) and Milan Lucic had two goals (one of them shorthanded) and an assist on the night while Marchand, Seidenberg, Nathan Horton and Adam McQuaid also had tallies for the B's.

The win gives Boston a little bit more breathing room against the Canadiens (still the next closest team in the Northeast standings), and the Bruins lead over Montreal in the Division standings after Thursday night was 3 points after Montreal lost in a shootout to the NY Islanders but still got the 1 point.

The original 6 mania will continue this weekend when the Bruins have a home-and-away series against the Detroit Red Wings, with the first half taking place in the TD Banknorth Garden on Friday night at 7PM ET and be broadcast on NESN and the NHL Network.

The second half of the weekend series will take place at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit on Sunday afternoon, 12:30 PM ET- this game will be nationally televised on Comcast's NBC network.

OTHER BRUINS NEWS: Marc Savard is expected to miss the remainder of the season with a concussion. Savard had been sidelined with another concussion after being hit by former teammate Matt Hunwick in the Jan 22nd game against Colorado.
ELSEWHERE IN THE NHL: Eureka! I think the Nashville Predators have devised one of the most devious and effective methods of luring NHL talent to Music City- it's even more effective than the Underpants gnomes' business model!

Phase one would be to send out fetching starlets along the lines of Carrie Underwood to romance forwards like....oh...I dunno....Mike Fisher. Then, after the wedding, honeymoon, and a few atrocious seasons in the division's basement playing in the Canadian capital, you're hot, popular and musically talented spouse gets it in your head that perhaps you would be better off elsewhere- maybe somewhere closer to where she spends a good deal of the year. Like....oh...say Nashville, TN. And since your team is dead last in the conference, and Nashville happens to have a team that's doing pretty good this season (trailing the Red Wings by 5 points for #2 in the Central divison and 5th overall in the Western conference) it sounds like to good a deal to pass up.

Well played, Predators.....well played. [Now all that's left is to convince them that Nashville is in dire need of lazy, talentless bloggers and I'm sure a stampede of country music starlets will be stampeeding a path to my doorway- NANESB!]

The Predators acquired Mike Fisher in a trade that will send a 1st round draft pick and a conditional pick to Ottawa. Fischer was tied for the lead in scoring for the Sens with 14 goals and 10 assists in 55 games this season, and the Predators are hoping he'll be ready in time for Friday night's game against Colorado.


NBA: I have to confess, I was intentionally holding off on doing another sports update until after Thursday night's Lakers/Celtics game- a move that didn't pay off despite getting off to a promising start.

Most noteworthy was Ray Allen surpassing Reggie Miller to become the NBA's all time career leader in 3 pointers, with 2,561 on Thursday night (see above). After hat, it was kinda downhill for the C's.

Although Boston took a 53-45 lead into halftime, Kobe Bryant scored 20 of his 23 points in the second half as LA rallied to come from behind after trailing by as many as 15 points in 1st. Pau Gasol had 20 points and 10 rebounds for the Lakers while the only player in green on Thursday to score more than 15 points was Ray Allen- with 20.

The lack of offense in the 2nd paved the way for a 92-86 Lakers win at the Garden. This is Boston's 2nd loss in a row after losing 94-89 at Charlotte on Monday night. The Celtics will next host the Miami Heat on Sunday afternoon at the Garden, 1 PM ET on ABC. The C's and the Heat are tied for first place overall in the Eastern conference.

NCAA HOCKEY: The 2011 Beanpot got underway on Monday, with Northeastern making their presence felt in a 4-0 thumping of Harvard in the opening game.

This was immediately followed by the BC Eagles getting by the BU Terriers in OT thanks to Eagle's Junior Tommy Cross scoring the game winner 3:17 into the extra period.

The games Monday set up a BC/Northeastern final for the 2011 Beanpot on Valentine's Day.

AHL HOCKEY: Following the lead of the NHL and the Syracuse Crunch, the Connecticut Whale (formerly the Hartford Wolfpack- the NY Ranger's AHL affiliate) has set up an outdoor rink at UConn's Rentschler Field in E. Hartford, CT. The rink will be used for outdoor junior and high school games as well as a Whalers/Bruins alumni game leading up to the Feb 19th game where the Whale will host the Providence Bruins.

OTHER AHL NEWS: A Connecticut judge has ordered an East Hartford man to apologize and 10 days of community service after he tackled and punched Pucky, the Whale mascot.

MLB: Never mind that rodent in Pennsylvania! Truck Day was this week, which means that Spring was right around the corner. The 'official' Red Sox truck (which, unsurprisingly, has a corporate sponsor) carrying the team's equipment left Fenway for Ft, Meyers, FL on Tuesday.


NCAA FOOTBALL: This video of UConn reserve quarterback Johnny McEntee has been circulating around the web. Heavily edited showboating or an appeal to get more playing time- what's your call?