What you missed last night while you helped out the girl across the hall who got locked out her apartment

Senators beat the Sabres, 4-2: The Senators are playing very well and their best players are lighting it up. Spezza scored 2 ridiculous goals. The first was short side on barely any release and the second was sick shot to the top corner. And Alfie scored the other 2. Meanwhile, Brian Elliot is coming into form nicely. Ottawa has escaped that clusterfuck of teams all battling for the 3 play-off spots.

Flames beat the Hurricanes, 4-1: Eric Staal got his face beaten up this game - a high stick and then his own man's skate after Mark Giordano dumped the cane into the bench. If Curtis Glenncross scores a hat trick, you should be winning.

Oilers shut-out the Flyers, 1-0: Oilers scored with 16 seconds left - heartbreaking. Also, because the Flyers had like 17 on-the-doorstep opportunities that they missed.

Blues beat the Hawks, 3-2: The Hawks goal were beauties. Kane went top shelf on the backhand on a breakaway and the pass from Toews to Hossa for the 2nd was pure filth.

Ducks beat the Wings, 3-1: Who's the starter and who's the back up in Detroit?

3-day Weekend Wrap Up OR Is Winter over? What the hell is up with this weather

Friday night Ovechkin had 5 points (a goal and 2 assists), Sunday Ovechkin had only 2 points (a goal and assist), but his goal was on a penalty shot, which is always cool and what Ovy has sometimes sucked at.



Rick Dipietro is back for the Islanders. He won Saturday and shut the Devils out on Monday. Thats the first time the Devils have been shut-out all season. Of the 6 goals the Isles scored this weekend. This was my favorite:




Speaking of slap-passes, Daniel Alfredsson had a hat-trick against the Bruins.Here's, obviously, my favorite:



Ok, its a slap-pass at all, just a great look from Kuba and tip by Alfie.

If you watched NBC's first non-winter-classic game of the season, you know they still have some kinks to work out:



What the hell?

but, if you stuck around you also got to see this sweetness in the shoot-out:



and there was also a pretty good fight:




What did I miss?

Bress

What you missed last night while you were finally finishing your crhistmas shopping

Since there are no games the rest of the week, today's recaps will be hockey haikus. Think of it as an early Christmas gift!

Penguins roll over the Senators, 8-2:
Lost in this blow out,
are Fleury's 45 saves.
And Alfie got hurt.

Blues beat the Flames in the shoot-out, 2-1:
On one play, Langkow
laid out Paul Kariya. The
Blues swept all the west.

Canadiens beat the Hurricanes, 5-1:
So, are all games that
the Canadiens play in
the southeast in French?

Islanders beat the Maple Leafs, 3-1:
Blake Comeau played great
He could be this teams, Selke
candidate. John scored!

Wild beat the Oilers, 3-1:
I think that Owen
Nolan should only be known
as Cowboy. He scored.

Flyers beat the Lightning, 5-2:
I hope the Flyers
improve after Christmas
for the Classic.

Blackhawks shut-out the Red Wings, 3-0:
They're not booing you
Hossa, they're say, "yoooooooou sucked
in the play-offs, jerk."

Coyotes shut-out the Ducks, 4-0:
If a team wins in
the desert and no one is
there, does it matter?

Stars beat the BJs, 3-1:
Fire Hitch? Trade who? What
are the Jackets going to
do to stop this slide?

Bruins beat the Thrashers. 6-4:
Boston looks like a
team hitting their groove. Kessel
who? exactly, right.

Rangers beat the Panthers, 4-1:
I was supposed to
go to this game, but glad I
did not. Gabby scored!

Capitals win over the Sabres, 5-2:
Ovechkin scored his
24th goal in his game
29. Dream's alive.

What you missed last night while you were watching the Twins win

For this season, Wednesday recaps will be known as Mid-week Monsters. I'll pick the best player from each game and tell you why.

Senators beat the Maple Leafs, 2-1: Alfie - he got the game winner with a nice move in during a penalty shot. He didn't draw it, but finished it nicely, with a move that froze the new bad Leafs goalie and then roofed the backhand.

Flyers win over the Capitals in OT, 6-5: Capt. Mike - Richards had a 2nd period hat-trick. Enough said. His first goals was a bad angle snipe off a great slap-pass. The second was a little luck on a wrister and the third was him going hard to the net and roofing Varlemov's goof.

Flames beat the Canadiens, 4-3: Eric Nystrom - 2 goals and a fight. None of it was pretty, but it all looks the same on a scoresheet.

Oilers beat the Stars in the shoot-out, 5-4: This wasn't a pretty game. I guess I'll say Khabibulin, because he got the win.

Kings win over the Sharks, 6-4: Jack Johnson - His goal was special. Handzus gave me an awful waist high saucer pass and some how JJ batted it in. But when you're up 4-0 and give away the lead, its tough to give the MwM award to a d-man, but that goal was sneaky special.

Wild beat the Ducks in OT, 4-3: John Scott - How does Minnesota have another huge fighter besides Boogard. Anyway, Scott dominated his fight agains t2MA! favorite George Parros

The Land of Barbonin

When the Hittites and the Menanites came over from Jerusalem, Mike Richards was born. Power "I" Richards as he was deemed by Camille (Pic below), the God of sick back hand toewy's top shelf in a hurry. He found young Mike strung out in a field near a basket of cale. He raised him as his own. Teaching him the ways of the sick back hand toewy top shelf in a hurry. He forced Mike to run between towns fetching produce and lumber to create the means to go top shelf in a hurry. Today we see Mike Richards in his highest form. His most pronounced definition of Mike Richards. The man has hustle and flow unlike most in the NHL. The ways of Mike Richards are a by-product of years of 3 Olives and mere patience to explode that moment when it presents itself.Camille currently has 139 points in 18 men's league games. A.K.A. blogger name Mr. W is a mean animal when he wants to be.

On to other news or once I landed in real life on Wednesday morning - My trip skiing to Colorado ended well. The last few runs, down the mountain my brother and I were moving upwards of at least 50 mph and could have reached 70 at some point. This is not an uncommon speed for very experienced skiiers by the way, Bress/Nemy. I mean we were going so fast and I had Nemy's BlueBlockers on that I couldn't see and had to stop because of the wind making my eyes so watery. If you are going to bomb on skiis, make sure you use your goggles just in case despite the weather outside. If your going to lumber down the mountain, then break the glasses out. The pic above is one taken from a peak at Vail which was just awesome.

On the way back to New York, I spotted Billy Mays in the security line behind us with his wife. He was so Billy Mays and to be honest he had no idea.

For those of you who don't recognize him by name.

Sitting in first class on our flight was Brian Engblom. Of course I gave him a 2man card and explained my side of it. He was kind and interested and somewhat surprised, I have to believe. Wish he still had a sick mullet!

While on the flight, I began to think about things. Why is Brind'Amour having such a low season? Here's why. He makes a nice play to get someone a goal last night against Ottawa and than the same shift turns it over at his own blue line and Chris Kelly snipes. Turning a nice positive into momentum shifting to the downside. His sack isn't fully there right now. Carolina may make the playoffs with Miller down and the Rangers racing furiously to the bottom. Be that as it may, i think rod may step it up on the playoffs. We'll let's be serious, I hope he will. Still leading the league in Faceoffs won though.

That was crazy though. 3 goals in like a minute last night in that game followed by Bushy Alf soaring thru the neutral zone and getting Dany Heat the puck to bury. Watch that goal and you will 100 percent see why Alfreddson is who he is. What strides man. Seriously!

Does Patty Lalime hold it down for the Sabres? Not well at least. He let in his first goal against on his second shot last night. That just has bad omens and 666's written all over it. Papa Shango is not impressed.

Do the Penguins get it together? To be honest I think they will clean themselves up and get into the playoffs but I also think they should go after another winger like they did with Hossa last season. Gonchaaaa is back and that adds powerplay value so you don't need to use Ryan Shannon at the point on your powerplay like Ottawa has been doing. Good or bad, it's just weird, that's all I'm saying.

Conundrum 717: On one of my fantasy teams, I have Mike Mckenna/Kari Ramo and Joey Mac/Yann Danis. At times, I didn't know who would be starting. They rarely let you know on TSN or yahoo so its a guess. However I figured out on my own that you can check a few minutes before game time on the box score and they will list on yahoo who is in net. No more guessing. Not that these goalies are going to lead us back to the land of Canaan however it is points and we are on a dog lay left here entering the turn and I already drank 9 beers. At this point I'm aiming 90 degrees to the left of my normal shot to compensate for the worst drunk slice since arboretum.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0anaCNDvGo

A quick synopsis of my Wednesday. Please get some!

- Luscious Barzell