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Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Guest Writer: Winter Classic Wrap Up Live From Mississippi


Well, while my down-south perspective of the Winter Classic certainly can't compare to Osgood's front row seats, I'm gonna throw my review of it out there anyway. In a word, it was AWESOME! I mean really, could there have been any more drama out there? Sure, the common perception is that the refs seemed to have some kind of deal with NBC to make the game as intense as possible, but since the Rangers held on to win it, I say “Kudos! That shit worked!!” Consider that I'm trying to sell the sport to my friends and fellow Mississippians, I need all the last second excitement the NHL can give me. The only thing it lacked, in my opinion, was someone rearranging Scott Hartnell's face just a little. Oh well, we play these pumpkins three more times so maybe next time, eh Rupper?

Forgive me, but I'm just gonna skip commenting on the first half of the game. Lundqvist made some huge saves early (does anyone expect anything less than God-like performances from this guy now?) and play was physical, but none matched the excitement of the last thirty minutes. When the Flyers opened the scoring, it was upsetting, but not devastating. We're a good team when we're only down by one. However, when they doubled up just shy of two minutes later, I could feel the panic setting in. Luckily that panic didn't even have time to fully manifest before... Mike Rupp sniped one in to cut the lead back in half? Huh? I never thought he'd be so clutch with his snap shot and open the scoring for the Rangers but yes! Just thirty seconds after the Flyers' second goal, Rupp picked up a super sweet feed from Prust and buried it on Bobrovsky. Oh, but it got better from there! Rupp's inflamatory Jagr salute was the perfect blueshirt jab for the former Ranger on his new home turf (kind of). I LOVED that! (Almost as much as I loved Jagr's thinly veiled attempt at not caring during the post game interviews. Nice try, buddy.) What surprised me was how many Flyer fans were incesenced about it. Um, the guy's been on your team for all of two months and suddenly he's unmockable? Considering Jagr's history with us, we're not going to get too hung up on a tough guy teasing the "future hall of famer" with a salute that, when watched in slo-mo, does seem semi Nazi-ish in its form and hold. Come to think of it, Rupp looks like he could have been an Arian extra in American History X.

The start of the third brought a little more fire to our guys and clearly the intermission hadn't broken the Rangers' momentum at all. Less than three minutes in, it became a tie game with...another goal from Rupp!?! No salute this time around, but this enforcer clearly earned his Broadway Hat after another nice pass from Prust found him driving down the side boards. Rupp's sniped wrister finds a tiny hole on Bobrovsky's short side and we were back to being deadlocked. I'm curious, do they have a number assigned to the armpit hole? That was like the .5 hole with how little space he had! As surprised as everyone was that Rupp came with his best Gaborik impression, unexpected heroes are usually the one's best suited for storybook endings...

Then, a mere three minutes after that, Dubinsky drew a crowd to Bobrovsky's right, which left Brad Richards all alone on the other side of the net. By the time Claude Giroux realized how bad his defensive zone positioning was and tried to recover, it was too late. The rebound of Dubinsky's second stab made its way over to Richards, who made no mistake in hitting the back of the net. 3-2 Rangers, and that's how it would end. But not before some tense moments in the Foxwoods final five...

The bullshit “delay of game” penalty given to McDonagh with 5:12 left to play was the just the start of what seemed like an incredibly skewed attempt to let Philly tie things up. Callahan also took a terrible penalty, this one with just 1:06 left as he raced in seemingly alone on an empty net, when the refs should have been looking to give him the auto-goal. With Bob-O out of the net and matching minors in the box, the Flyers still had an extra man advantage, but Lundqvist stood tall as the clock wound down. Under a minute...45 seconds...30 seconds...we're gonna make it...oh, hell no! Did the refs really award a penalty shot with only 19.6 seconds left in a one goal game? Of course they did! Honestly, it's a miracle this game didn't kill me. Thankfully, Lunqvist showed everyone in Philly why he's called the King. Briere displayed hardly any skill or forethought at all and he was awarded with a stoning for the ages. The clock finally made it's excruciatingly slow journey all the way to zero and the game was in the books. The Rangers persevered again. We won. I was finally able to breathe again...

I know this counted for just two point like any other game, but so much more was on the line here. First place in the East, for one thing, a cushion atop the Atlantic for another. Pride over the biggest regular season win we'll have all year, as well. Not to mention beating a huge division rival for the third straight time this season. And if anyone else around my neck of the woods was a hockey fan, I'd certainly be enjoying my fair share of bragging rights! There's still half a season to play, but this year feels different, and it sure would be nice to be able to claim 35 pounds of sterling silver come June. Again boys, please don't let the cries of a misplaced hockey fan go unheeded. Keep up the hustle, keep up the winning, and LET'S GO RANGERS!!

PS - Just to further illustrate how much it sucks being a hockey fan in Mississippi, I had to watch the game on a laptop via NBC Sports live-streaming, complete with buffering and the occasional time lapse. For reasons still unknown, about 10 minutes before the puck drop, my local NBC station cut back to "already in progress, regularly scheduled, local programming". Yeah, I came pretty close to losing my shit right about then. Thank God for the internet...

By Kelly Caldwell

If you'd like to contribute to '94 Parade by penning an article of your own, please feel free! Just a reminder though to send your drafts to phillip.osgood@gmail.com because I'm such a lazy scrub that I find it nearly impossible to check more than two email accounts daily...

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