Stanley Cup Playoffs Game #6: Minnesota Wild vs Colorado Avalanche, Monday 4-28-14, 8:00pm, Xcel Energy Center

Minnesota Wild (2-3)

2.40 Goals For (13th)

2.80 Goals Against (6th)

13.3% Power Play (11th)

94.4% Penalty Kill (1st)

Top 5 Scorers:

1. #11 Zach Parise ~ 1G 5A = 6pts

2. #3 Charlie Coyle ~ 3G 1A = 4pts

3. #64 Mikael Granlund ~ 1G 2A = 3pts

4. #9 Mikko Koivu  ~ 0G 3A = 3pts

5. #29 Jason Pominville ~ 0G 3A = 3pts

Top 3 PIM’s:

1. #8 Cody McCormick ~ 14 PIM’s

2. #4 Clayton Stoner ~ 8 PIM’s

3. #24 Matt Cooke ~ 6 PIM’s

Top Goaltender:

1. #35 Darcy Kuemper (2-1)   1.40GAA   .940SV%

2. #30 Ilya Bryzgalov (0-2)  4.85GAA  .822SV%

 

 

Vs.

 

 

Colorado Avalanche (3-2)

2.80  Goals For (11th)

2.40 Goals Against (4th)

5.6% Power Play (16th)

86.7% Penalty Kill (6th)

Top 5 Scorers:

1. #29 Nathan MacKinnon ~ 2G 8A = 10pts

2. #26 Nathan MacKinnon ~ 3G 5A = 8pts

3. #92 Gabriel Landeskog ~ 3G 1A = 4pts

4. #90 Ryan O’Reilly ~ 2G 2A = 4pts

5. #11 Jamie McGinn ~ 1G 2A = 3pts

Top 3 PIM’s:

1. #55 Cody McLeod ~ 12 PIM’s

2. #92 Gabriel Landeskog ~ 6 PIM’s

3. #2 Nick Holden ~ 6 PIM’s

Top Goaltenders:

1. #1 Semyon Varlamov (3-2)  2.33GAA  .931SV%

 

Well I’m glad that the NHL’s officiating on Saturday night lived up to our (low) expectations.  You know it was bad when some of the talking heads around the league also said it was bad.  First, we had Kerry Fraser, who was a long-time referee.  Heck, earlier in this series I mentioned him as he was in the Playoff Preview issue of The Hockey News.  He’s the kind of veteran official with the kind of credentials I’d like to take Brad Meier and Kerry Sutherland (as well as the linesman) and have Fraser ask these buffoons what the hell they were thinking.  In the many years of hockey I’ve watched, and at all levels, Saturday night’s game had to have been the worst officiated I’ve ever seen.  Then there’s the case of the missing Tweet.

Yes, that is from that Mike Modano.  And then just hours later, that Tweet has been scrubbed from Modano’s Twitter feed.  That can be easily explained, because Modano has a position within the Dallas Stars organization.  The league prohibits any team employee from publicly criticizing the league’s officials, hence the case of the missing Tweet.  Of course, this is the beauty of the internet, once it’s out there, it’s out there.  Jeremy Roenick has also questioned the officiating.  There were rumors that we were going to have Meier and Sutherland for tonight’s game as well, but thankfully, it was just rumor.  Tonight, it will be Paul Devorski and Francis Charron.  I would like to say there’s no possible way they could mess up as much as Meier and Sutherland.  However, if you need some laughs after Saturday night, I give you this:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0SEXTBeg4o]

Like Wild head coach Mike Yeo and various players have said, the players need to put Saturday night’s travesty (and yes, it was a travesty) behind them.  What the Wild need, is an absolute repeat of Games 3 and 4.  They must absolutely suffocate Colorado’s offense.  That was the best part of those games, seeing the Avs reeling in disbelief, especially a confused Patrick Roy.  Yeo noted there was a “dip in urgency” by his players Saturday night, and that absolutely cannot happen tonight.  And speaking of Patrick Roy, in honor of his return to Minnesota, there’s nothing that I would like more than to have Andrew Brunette do tonight’s “Let’s Play Hockey” at the X tonight.  Game 3 featured Richard Park and Game 4 was Jim Dowd.  It wouldn’t only be natural to see Brunette or possibly Wes Walz do tonight’s, although I’m hoping for Bruno.

If tonight’s game is our elimination game, all I ask for is that it’s not because of questionable officiating.  However considering the officiating this entire series, and for and against both teams, I’m not holding out much hope.  Regardless of who wins this game and ultimately this series, there is plenty of blame that can be lobbed at the officials and the league offices that stand behind them.  Officiating in general has been bad this season, but it is now under a magnifying glass.  The winner in this series will be the referees, not the players and coaches.  You might as well put an asterisk after the name of the winner of this series.  If it’s any consolation, I highly doubt the officiating can be worse tonight than it was on Saturday.  We’ve seen the low, and hopefully we can all see officiating as it is supposed to be.  Fingers crossed.