Sens 3, Pens 2: In Which We Compare And Contrast "Shits" And "Giggles"

Here's a hint. Giggles had the hat trick.

The Highs:

• This? 'Tis but a scratch!: Sure, the natural hat trick was nice. Congrats on that, Jason. So is your continued ability to make the Penguins your personal whores (27 points in 20 games). But do you really want to know how to make the mouth breathers who normally howl "we gotta trade his ass!" during the call-in shows check themselves? Get up laughing after taking the biggest hit of your career and proceed to send the opponents a giant SUCK IT! by scoring a goal. Again. That would be perfect.
  

• Your mission, should you choose to accept it...: Okay folks, we need a better nick name for the Big Line than either "pizza" or (ugh!) "CASH". They turned Atlanta into gooey piles of despair (but that was Atlanta) and followed that up by fashioning Julien's little boy toys into pylons while being among the toughest hombres on the ice (bonus points to The Captain for walking off a bullet to the top of his foot). I'm thinking "Two-Four". As in: If we're playing on Victoria Day weekend, it's because of this line.
  

• Screw secondary scoring. You boys just keep on keepin' on: We would be remiss if we didn't mention the contributions from the supporting cast. The Winch, Little Nicky and Chris "K-Rock" Kelly keeping the Pens hemmed in their own end most of the time while being general pains in the ass...Roto Ruutu and his sneaky little elbows (somewhere Gordie Howe smiles...and asks for more tapioca). Then there's our boy C-Bass. Did you know he was playing with a broken toe? Neither did I. He laces on a pair of skates and spends three hours catching 100mph slapshots with his feet. Me? I'm lying on the couch, popping vicodin like candy while Beloved starts looking for a divorce lawyer.
  

The Lows (only two of which deal with the Cee Bee Cee):

• Next time, just shoot the hostage: That was one hell of a dilemma, wasn't it Brendan? It certainly looked that way. How else to explain why, after watching your "pass" go squirting onto the stick of Jordan Staal like some palsy stricken wombat, you stood there, flummoxed, while Evgeni Freakin Malkin went streaking by you three feet to your right? Malkin's ensuing short handed goal to pull Pittsburgh within one with ten minutes to go in the game probably gave you a clue as to how to handle that particular situation in the future, yes? Look around, dumbass.
  

• HURRY HARD! And get the HELL off my t.v.!: Mother Corp has been broadcasting curling for many, many years. I should know. For as long as I can remember (which is quite a few more years than I'd care to admit), there have been many a time when I have been lulled into blissful slumber on a Sunday afternoon by the dulcet tones of Don Wittman (R.I.P). So with all that experience, you'd think the pinheads that run the CBC would know how long the average curling match will run, and schedule the remainder of their programming accordingly, right? Right? Wouldn't you think? Yeah, I'd have thought so too, until I missed the first three minutes of this game for the semi finals of something called the The Capital One Grand Slam Of Curling. Dear CBC: If it doesn't say "Brier" or "Scotties" on the trophy, move it to Country Canada or Bold or whatever the hell you're calling your crap cable channel this week, and give me my fucking hockey game.

• You're looking particularly amorphous this evening, Mr. Galley: I am the proud owner of a 56" High Definition television. Ma Bell extorts me to the tune of $110 a month for the privilege of beaming High Definition satellite signals into my home. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation has an annual, taxpayer funded operating budget somewhere north of one billion dollars. HD cameras cost much, much less than that. So why did this game look like it was being broadcast from the bottom of a swimming pool?
  

Pithy Observation of Questionable Importance:

We are now 4-0 when wearing those hideous third jerseys. Now I don't generally subscribe to superstition (unless my lucky Redskins socks are involved) but if someone tells me the I'm going to die the Senators are going to lose unless I keep a bowling pin jammed up my ass they keep wearing that jersey...I'd have to think long and hard about it.

Creamy Middle:

Not as dominant as they were against Atlanta (but again...that was Atlanta) and there were times in the early going where it looked like the boys had slipped back into their evil ways of sloth, apathy and general crapitude AND Coach Craig's recurring habit of jamming on the brakes by throwing the trap onto the ice late in a close game still drives me batshit (safe is DEATH, Coach), but still a quality win. If the boys are on, as they were through a large portion of this game and as they were for the entire Thrashers game, it's obvious we can play with anybody. Sooner or later, they're going to start believing that. I hope.

Next Up:

The barrel of yuks that is Jacques Martin brings his Florida Panthers to The Bank on Monday night (7:30pm, Sportnet East or...RDS for you coalition types). Remember how Now Florida Head Coach but Then Nobody Peter DeBoer jerked The Bryan around for a month last summer before The Bryan finally said "fuck it" and signed Hartsburg? Yeah, me neither.

And hey! We finally get to see that Bowmeester kid! Don Brennan should have him traded to Ottawa for Jason Spezza, Dany Heatly, Daniel Alfredsson, the athletic staff and a small block of cheddar by the end of the first period.

Behind Enemy Lines:

Well, lah-di-dah, look who's made the big time! A scant six weeks after being mentioned on this very site, The Litter Box has been drafted into Mirtle's SB Nation army of hockey blogger brilliance. Coincidence? I think not. Congrats, Whale. Well deserved, indeed.