Panthers vs. Devils. Not Hopeful About This One.

VS.

Nothing like facing Martin Brodeur and the New Jersey Devils to cure your losing streak and your goal scoring drought.  Right?  Not.  Tonight the Panthers face Marty and company as Brodeur tries to set the record for most shutouts by an NHL goaltender as he goes for number 104!  Perfect. 

By the way the Devils are also on a four game winning streak including seven of eight.  They bring a 21-7-1 record tonight with a 10-5 record at home.

With those kind of numbers they deserve a day off.  But knowing Jacques Lemaire, he’s probably got them working fairly hard.

The Panthers, well here’s the deal.  Their record is 11-14-6.  They have lost four straight and are 1-5-4 in their last ten games. This is game two of a four game road trip which started Wednesday night with a loss against the Columbus Blue Jackets by a 3-0 score.  For that, they got a day off Thursday.  They also got a day off Tuesday.  Hmmmm.  Let me ask you.  In most jobs if you do good work and you get good results you then earn yourself some time off right?  But if you don’t do your job or don’t produce results you don’t get that time off and you could even get fired right?  Maybe I don’t understand something, but, what the hell’s going on here?  Can someone explain why these guys are getting days off when they’re playing like this?  Don’t give me any B.S. about the schedule either.  If that’s the case then they are not conditioned properly.

The PP is still piss poor even after getting a 5 on 3 chance in the third period in Wednesday’s game.  At least they didn’t blow the lead in the third period like they’ve done 5 of 8 times since November 16th.  Rhino, remember him?  People were singing his praises when he got to ten goals earlier.  Lately, we are wondering if he’s still playing as he has one goal in his last eighteen games.  Lazy Ass, nothing going on for him either.  For that matter has 2 shots on goal in his last two games! The Little Weasel, had a great week last week as he was named the NHL’s number two star, and got himself mentioned on Coaches Corner with Don Cherry last Saturday night.  Since then he’s kind of cooled off.  I mean c’mon we can’t expect him to score every night right?  Surely you knew he had to come back down to earth.

Good teams that make the playoffs don’t go through the streaks that the Panthers do.  They win a bunch, then lose a bunch and in between they lose more than they win.  They currently have 28 points.  In order to get to 94 which would be one more point then they had last year when they missed the playoffs they are going to have to win 67 % of their remaining games.  Ask yourself:  Do you really and truly believe that will happen?

Don’t kid yourself, or fool yourself either.  Not gonna happen unless the sky falls.  Be careful as the Maple Leafs are gaining on us as well after a horrific start to their season.

New Jersey has some real solid players and gets some balanced scoring.  They are lead by Zach Parise who leads them in goals with 15 and points with 34, followed by Jamie Langenbrunner with 7 goals and 20 assists for 27 points.  Keep your eye out for former Panther Rob Niedermayer who has found his niche as a checking forward and no longer has the pressure to score 30 goals a season.

The Devils are 21-8-0 with three ties at home against the Panthers and Marty has won 25 of 31 games against the Cats during that time with a sparkling 1.86 GAA and three shutouts.  Beauty!

I honestly feel that the clock is ticking for something to happen with the Panthers.  Trade, waiver pickup, coaching change.  Something.  We cannot continue to allow this type of play to be acceptable.    Since the new ownership group took over the Panthers have lost nine of ten games.  But when you’re losing and your getting days off, what does that say?  Where’s the accountability that we were promised.  Don’t tell me that our roster is bare and we don’t have the depth, which might be partially true.  Fix it.

David Booth has been out since when? End of October?  The minute we knew he wasn’t coming back for awhile the braintrust should have started looking around for a replacement.  We were already offensively challenged with him, and to lose him and his potential 30-35 goals for any long stretch makes it that much worse.  And as we have seen the kids from Rochester just don’t have it.

DeBoer has been making some questionable moves lately, and his easy going way about him has me flabbergasted.  Where’s the hard ass attitude?  Where’s the fire?  His groundhog day comment from Monday night still has me laughing.  Not with him, at him!   Has he lost the room, or is he afraid of losing the room?  Or has he been told, keep it together?  I’m stumped and no longer impressed with him.

Tonight he faces another experienced coach who also has a Stanley Cup Championship on his resume.  It will be another night of going to school.

Let me hear from ya, readers!  You can’t be satisfied with this can you?

Thanks for reading.

Cheers