dondo
03-09-2008, 02:14 AM
Not a bad game over-all. Reffing sucked for both teams and there were penalties that should not have been called and others that were ignored when they shouldn't have been. All in all a very inconsistent outing for the zebras. Beatch lived up to his name, as he was in my opinion no help to his team and at times a major hindrance. It took a team effort to preserve the goose-egg.
Giants Nip Tips 1-0 - VGHQ (http://www.vancouvergiantshq.com/March_8_GiantsbkNipbkTips_205.html)
Giants Nip Tips
Vancouver 1 Everett 0
Don Robinson
A very tight game tonight as the Giants went back to playing defense first hockey and the Silvertips did too. Tyson Sexsmith earned the shut-out turning away 23 shots for the goose-egg. His best save was glove stop off of Zack Dailey on a clear breakaway. He was very good gathering up rebounds and defending the bottom of the net when loose pucks were bouncing around his crease. Leland Irving also played a very solid game, but did not have turn away very dangerous chances in the end as the ‘Tips did a great job clearing pucks from the front of the net. The ‘Tips were looking more like the KC squad than the Becanic squad. They sat back and protected their end of the ice waiting for errors which tonight were few and far between. For the second night in a row the Giants top players did not look like it as they allowed themselves to be kept to the outside for the majority of the night. It took a rookie and a grinder to get the Giants the lead which happened at 2:30 of the second period off of a broken play in the Everett end of the ice. James Henry got his 7th of the season off of a feed by Garet Hunt of all people and it proved to be the only goal of the night for either squad.
I hate to harp on the reffing two games in row, but it was yet again a travesty and the Tips got off lucky with far fewer than they should have got running pick plays and starting scrums with nasty crosschecks and no penalties called. Devin Klein and Nathan Weiler had seriously weak games, but both teams failed to take advantage of their man-advantage opportunities. There were a few fights and few what should have been fights had certain gutless players actually dropped the gloves and been men about the whole thing. You all know who I am talking about, be prepared for a full paragraph describing why he is such a cheap-ass pathetic player who should focus on offense and leave the physical stuff to honourable players. Eric English and Hunt are first on the fight card and had English actually stepped away from the boards and really gone for it could have been a good battle. As it was it was mostly a wrestling match which was stopped when the players came away from the boards and Garet started to get a few good shots in.
Chris Cloud was given an instigator for taking down Jonathan Harty who mostly turtled as soon as he started losing, after a cheap check from behind along the boards. Harty challenged James Henry after Henry laid the body from behind, but both players went down pretty quickly.
Okay be warned Kyle lovers or those of you who don’t want to hear the truth about Beatch. I title this paragraph “Gutless Weasel”. Beatch was more than useless tonight and for such a skilled player who spends way too much time diving, yapping and pretending to fight with his gloves on, he could actually be a force on the scoresheet and not in the penalty box. Still far less than he should be spending in the sin-bin, but that’s a whole other argument. It all started when the warm-up was ending and Beatch all of a sudden threw himself at the glass in some machoesque manner of juvenile enthusiasm. It wasn’t like there were fans at the glass egging him on or anything, he just did it out of nowhere for no apparent reason other than a terribly misguided ego. Personally I think he’s compensating seriously for some “short comings”, but that’s up to interpretation.
Okay make that two paragraphs. During the game he took some very selfish and dangerous penalties. Then, he was the first to throw the glove punch and not unlike Chris Bruton (who is really my hero by the way – watching him drop Beatch was pure joy) La Rochelle dropped the mitts and began to seriously pound on him and would have taught the little beatch a serious lesson, but sadly the linesmen stepped in. Beatch did not drop the gloves although he instigated the whole altercation and was given a mere roughing by the clueless refs who seem determined to support and defend this kind of behaviour. La Rochelle was given a double minor for defending himself. Ridiculous. Any honourable player would have dropped the mitts, but Beatch got the extra two for his team (which they did nothing with) and lost even more credibility as a serious hockey player. Then later in the game he had a puck (shot by his own player mind you) glance off what appeared to be his grill and he drops to the ice and lays there madly scissoring his legs up and down like a two year old in the throes of tantrum. No penalty is called and after being helped off the ice with a towel held to his face (which was just a ruse it turns out) he plays the shift after with no blood, no stitches and no apparent damage.
Okay maybe three... How much longer can we put up with this cry wolf crap from this beatch who makes the grotesque divers in soccer look honourable. How much longer will the league coddle this piece of crap before someone does something about this. This is everything that’s bad for hockey and yet the league has been turning a blind eye when they need to make an example of these kinds of antics which do nothing except put the credibility of the entire game in question. Total crap in my mind and this is the kind of player and behaviour that needs to be exorcised from the game. Get rid of the instigator and this stuff and these kinds of players go away. Just because the NHL has decided to reward cheap-shot artists there’s no reason for the WHL to follow suit. Okay that’s my rant. I just don’t understand a player who has such obvious skill and ability resorting to this kind of juvenile crap and for such a volatile personality he is probably the most gutless cowardly player in the dub.
Back to the game recap – just had to get that in print and off of my chest as it was weighing a tad heavily. The Giants out-shot the visitors 42-23. Both squads were unable to make their PP work as the Giants went 0 for 9 and the ‘Tips 0 for 7 on the man-advantage tonight. The game itself was a very tight checking affair with neither team giving their opponent a real chance to make a play. The energy and the intensity were pretty good and but for a nice goal by Henry the game could have gone all the way to the evil what is the shootout, just where the ‘Tips usually like to end up. No real standout players for the G’s tonight or really either squad as both of the teams played as teams keeping the puck away from their net and limiting second chances. It’s truly nerve-wracking watching your team nursing a 1-0 lead, but the Giants did a pretty decent job making sure Tyson got the shut-out as they were mostly successful clearing the front of the net allowing Sexsmith to see the shots, limiting turnovers and second chances. Sexsmith padded his league lead in shut-outs and now has 9 on the season. Other than the great stop on Dailey he did not have to be exceptional to get the blank sheet.
The Giants have three more games left in the regular season, two at home and one away. They are tied with the Spokane Chiefs and Tri-City Americans with 100 pts for all the squads and will need to run the table to have a chance to claim the Western Conference title for second straight season. Tri-City have one game in hand, while the Chiefs have two games in hand coming into the home stretch. The Giants have already locked up the BC division title though and as such are guaranteed home ice advantage for the first round of the playoffs. It appears as if the Giants will face either the Bruins or the Blazers as both teams battle to stay out of eighth spot. Prince George and Portland are already out of the mix as the top eight teams in the Conference have been decided, but the exact order is still up in air. The Vancouver squad’s next tilt is at home hosting the visiting Cougar squad who are doing a nice job of playing spoiler since being ousted from the playoffs. The game takes place on Friday the 14th of March and as usual on Friday nights the puck will drop at 7:30 pm PDT. Note that thanks to GWB down south we will already be in daylight savings time for that tilt.
Three Stars
1. RJ LaRochelle
2. Leland Irving
3. Tyson Sexsmith
Giants Nip Tips 1-0 - VGHQ (http://www.vancouvergiantshq.com/March_8_GiantsbkNipbkTips_205.html)
Giants Nip Tips
Vancouver 1 Everett 0
Don Robinson
A very tight game tonight as the Giants went back to playing defense first hockey and the Silvertips did too. Tyson Sexsmith earned the shut-out turning away 23 shots for the goose-egg. His best save was glove stop off of Zack Dailey on a clear breakaway. He was very good gathering up rebounds and defending the bottom of the net when loose pucks were bouncing around his crease. Leland Irving also played a very solid game, but did not have turn away very dangerous chances in the end as the ‘Tips did a great job clearing pucks from the front of the net. The ‘Tips were looking more like the KC squad than the Becanic squad. They sat back and protected their end of the ice waiting for errors which tonight were few and far between. For the second night in a row the Giants top players did not look like it as they allowed themselves to be kept to the outside for the majority of the night. It took a rookie and a grinder to get the Giants the lead which happened at 2:30 of the second period off of a broken play in the Everett end of the ice. James Henry got his 7th of the season off of a feed by Garet Hunt of all people and it proved to be the only goal of the night for either squad.
I hate to harp on the reffing two games in row, but it was yet again a travesty and the Tips got off lucky with far fewer than they should have got running pick plays and starting scrums with nasty crosschecks and no penalties called. Devin Klein and Nathan Weiler had seriously weak games, but both teams failed to take advantage of their man-advantage opportunities. There were a few fights and few what should have been fights had certain gutless players actually dropped the gloves and been men about the whole thing. You all know who I am talking about, be prepared for a full paragraph describing why he is such a cheap-ass pathetic player who should focus on offense and leave the physical stuff to honourable players. Eric English and Hunt are first on the fight card and had English actually stepped away from the boards and really gone for it could have been a good battle. As it was it was mostly a wrestling match which was stopped when the players came away from the boards and Garet started to get a few good shots in.
Chris Cloud was given an instigator for taking down Jonathan Harty who mostly turtled as soon as he started losing, after a cheap check from behind along the boards. Harty challenged James Henry after Henry laid the body from behind, but both players went down pretty quickly.
Okay be warned Kyle lovers or those of you who don’t want to hear the truth about Beatch. I title this paragraph “Gutless Weasel”. Beatch was more than useless tonight and for such a skilled player who spends way too much time diving, yapping and pretending to fight with his gloves on, he could actually be a force on the scoresheet and not in the penalty box. Still far less than he should be spending in the sin-bin, but that’s a whole other argument. It all started when the warm-up was ending and Beatch all of a sudden threw himself at the glass in some machoesque manner of juvenile enthusiasm. It wasn’t like there were fans at the glass egging him on or anything, he just did it out of nowhere for no apparent reason other than a terribly misguided ego. Personally I think he’s compensating seriously for some “short comings”, but that’s up to interpretation.
Okay make that two paragraphs. During the game he took some very selfish and dangerous penalties. Then, he was the first to throw the glove punch and not unlike Chris Bruton (who is really my hero by the way – watching him drop Beatch was pure joy) La Rochelle dropped the mitts and began to seriously pound on him and would have taught the little beatch a serious lesson, but sadly the linesmen stepped in. Beatch did not drop the gloves although he instigated the whole altercation and was given a mere roughing by the clueless refs who seem determined to support and defend this kind of behaviour. La Rochelle was given a double minor for defending himself. Ridiculous. Any honourable player would have dropped the mitts, but Beatch got the extra two for his team (which they did nothing with) and lost even more credibility as a serious hockey player. Then later in the game he had a puck (shot by his own player mind you) glance off what appeared to be his grill and he drops to the ice and lays there madly scissoring his legs up and down like a two year old in the throes of tantrum. No penalty is called and after being helped off the ice with a towel held to his face (which was just a ruse it turns out) he plays the shift after with no blood, no stitches and no apparent damage.
Okay maybe three... How much longer can we put up with this cry wolf crap from this beatch who makes the grotesque divers in soccer look honourable. How much longer will the league coddle this piece of crap before someone does something about this. This is everything that’s bad for hockey and yet the league has been turning a blind eye when they need to make an example of these kinds of antics which do nothing except put the credibility of the entire game in question. Total crap in my mind and this is the kind of player and behaviour that needs to be exorcised from the game. Get rid of the instigator and this stuff and these kinds of players go away. Just because the NHL has decided to reward cheap-shot artists there’s no reason for the WHL to follow suit. Okay that’s my rant. I just don’t understand a player who has such obvious skill and ability resorting to this kind of juvenile crap and for such a volatile personality he is probably the most gutless cowardly player in the dub.
Back to the game recap – just had to get that in print and off of my chest as it was weighing a tad heavily. The Giants out-shot the visitors 42-23. Both squads were unable to make their PP work as the Giants went 0 for 9 and the ‘Tips 0 for 7 on the man-advantage tonight. The game itself was a very tight checking affair with neither team giving their opponent a real chance to make a play. The energy and the intensity were pretty good and but for a nice goal by Henry the game could have gone all the way to the evil what is the shootout, just where the ‘Tips usually like to end up. No real standout players for the G’s tonight or really either squad as both of the teams played as teams keeping the puck away from their net and limiting second chances. It’s truly nerve-wracking watching your team nursing a 1-0 lead, but the Giants did a pretty decent job making sure Tyson got the shut-out as they were mostly successful clearing the front of the net allowing Sexsmith to see the shots, limiting turnovers and second chances. Sexsmith padded his league lead in shut-outs and now has 9 on the season. Other than the great stop on Dailey he did not have to be exceptional to get the blank sheet.
The Giants have three more games left in the regular season, two at home and one away. They are tied with the Spokane Chiefs and Tri-City Americans with 100 pts for all the squads and will need to run the table to have a chance to claim the Western Conference title for second straight season. Tri-City have one game in hand, while the Chiefs have two games in hand coming into the home stretch. The Giants have already locked up the BC division title though and as such are guaranteed home ice advantage for the first round of the playoffs. It appears as if the Giants will face either the Bruins or the Blazers as both teams battle to stay out of eighth spot. Prince George and Portland are already out of the mix as the top eight teams in the Conference have been decided, but the exact order is still up in air. The Vancouver squad’s next tilt is at home hosting the visiting Cougar squad who are doing a nice job of playing spoiler since being ousted from the playoffs. The game takes place on Friday the 14th of March and as usual on Friday nights the puck will drop at 7:30 pm PDT. Note that thanks to GWB down south we will already be in daylight savings time for that tilt.
Three Stars
1. RJ LaRochelle
2. Leland Irving
3. Tyson Sexsmith