Where else can one start other than…

No Matter How You Look At it, Away From the Play, PK Subban Delivered a Malicious Two Handed Slash to Mark Stone’s Fucking Wrist
OR
GottaHearBothSidesGate

Whether you’re a man or a woman or who knows what spice, there comes a time in every man’s life when she/he/zhe has to man up and BE A MAN. Part of being a man, is shrugging off a two handed hack to your bare wrist like nothing happened. You do it every day at your job. I do it every day here at the body painting studio I intern at. In a man’s (man’s man’s) world, there’s no place for any of this writhing in pain, “waah, waah my wrist has been fractured I am going to miss a large portion of the game because I’m ACTING” type acting. Now, a key part of acting is voluntarily leaving one of the most important games of your career for extended periods of time to fool the referees and opposition into THINKING you’re hurt. Now that Mark Stone might miss time or the rest of this series? Well, from the mouth of an expert:

“The plan worked. We’ve got them right where we want them now that Mark Stone may not be able to play well or at all.”
                                                                   – James Lipton, Inside the Actor’s Studio

Look, this all boils down to one harsh reality: The HERstorical tradition that is Playoff Brand™ Hockey. Every spring when we don our visorless helmets and sit on our futons to eat chips and drink beer in front of a television, we bravely put ourselves at risk. We know what we’re getting into and the players do too. They should know that when you LACE “M” UP that you do so with the knowledge that your opponent can and will flagrantly break the rules of the game and maliciously try to injure you. IT’S CALLED THE PLAYOFFS. Why would we want to watch the sport at its best when we can see it at its ugliest? Let’s injure the best players out of the way so we can finally get more of that David Legwand vs. Brian Flynn battle that we the fans so crave.

So I’m with the HNIC garbage panel. Mark Stone shouldn’t have gotten his wrist in the way of that stick and let justice be done though the heavens fall in his upcoming disciplinary hearing for his FAKE CT scan at some EURO hospital. Stone’s shady history certainly will not do him any favours.

The fallout of this, of course, is that Chris Neil could draw into the line up should Stone be too high on painkillers to play. It’s no secret that many of our contributors at WTYKY don’t think Neil is the player he used to be. Frankly, he’s got his work cut out for him jumping back into the line up against a speedy team after missing about 8 weeks, and into playoff hockey no less. I will say this though, it’s not like I’m rooting against the guy. This is the kind of situation where Ottawa needs him to be the best damn Chris Neil he can be. Ye olde Chris Neil that actually drew penalties and chipped in the grimiest of goals. He needs to do the running around hitting and distracting so the rest of the team can focus. Playoffs are where he can be his best. With his future in Ottawa in question this could potentially be a bit of a swan song for him. Love him or hate him, he was built for playoff hockey.

Lazar-Pageau-Condra Line Continues To Buzz All Game Long…HEYYY You Know Who Else I’d Like to See Buzz All Game Long? THE OTHER LINES.

I mean, you gotta hear both sides when all three of Ottawa’s goals came from –Markov-  Michalek, Turris and Zibanejad but am I alone in thinking that if the top had 6 played near the level of 27-44-22 on Wednesday that the Sens would have totally smothered the Habs?
I love having enough depth at forward that our 3rd line is a secret weapon but ehhh, top six, not exactly a bunch of chuds either. It was encouraging to see the ALLEGEDLY perfectly healthy Bobby Ryan who cant seem to be able to shoot anymore because he’s ALLEGEDLY perfectly healthy, adjusting and using his size to get all up in Carey Prix’s world. In my opinion, despite finishing with no points, he was a huge part of both Turris’ and Zibanejad’s goals.

Speaking of Goals…There Were a Lot of Those Last Game
Glad to see the lack of hand wringing over Hammond finishing with an uncharacteristic loss in Game 1. He did not look tremendous on a couple of goals but overall didn’t really seem shaky considering he was playing in the fucking AHL a couple of months ago.
Behind the Scenes Story: On Wednesday after a nice save I looked over at Varada *holds for 10 minutes of applause* and said, “Can you believe we’re watching Andrew Hammond as the undisputed starter in a playoff series?…Also, are you going to finish the rest of that tall can?” What a wild ride this continues to be.
Epilogue: He indeed finished the tall can.
Truth be told, Carey Price let in the biggest stinker of the game and it’s not as if he suddenly stinks (though that would be incredibly handy like it was in 2013). I think Hammond will also be fine. If he can play even just a bit a bit better I’m confident the Sens can outscore these schlubs. It was a fucked up game and I expect game 2 to be a clean slate for both of these goalies.

Overall, I think Ottawa could have played quite a bit better against a Paccioretty and Subban-free Canadiens. I can remember about 5 incomplete passes that could have put the game away pretty early had they connected. Hopefully the jitters are out of the system because if that’s what Montreal looks like in a win, this could be an interesting series.

Let’s get the tinfoil on under the wrist guards and split this fucker.

GO SENS GO!