Another Weekend Worth

Well, it's another weekend long recap, as it's been another busy weekend. When the weather gets nice, it's hard to stay indoors long enough to write thse up.

Friday night, a pair of Game 1's in the second round took place, as the Red Wings/Ducks series got underway, plus the Bruin/Hurricanes started their Eastern Conference series as well.

In Detroit, the Red Wings opened up a 1-0 series lead over the Ducks, thanks to a 3-2 win. Nicklas Lidstrom was the big star of the game, not to mention the big pool player as well, scoring a pair of goals, including the winner, plus an assist for a 4-point night. Lidstrom is the most popular player in Box 8 of the sheet, taken 24 times.

For Boston, it was a 4-1 win to open up their series, now leading the Hurricanes 1-0. Marc Savard was the leading scorer of the game, scoring a pair of goals, including the winner, in the game for 3 pool points.

Saturday's action saw a Game 1 series start and another series playing in Game 2. In the afternoon, it was Game 1 for the Penguins & Capitals. The Capitals opened up with a tight 3-2 win to take a 1-0 series lead, which was led by Tomas Fleischmann, Nicklas Backstrom and Alex Semin, who all had 2 points a piece for the pool. When you're getting solid pool production, you should be doing alright in the game.

In the other action, it was the Blackhawks taking full advantage of the Canucks, beating them 6-3 in Game 2 to tie the series up at 1-1, heading to Chicago for Game 3. No one player in the pool really dominated the pool scoring, as there were just a number of players in the game that managed to pick up a pair of points a piece. Nikolai Khabibulin, Patrick Sharp, Patrick Kane, Mats Sundin, Henrik Sedin and Alex Edler.

Finally, we come to Sunday, where we had both series of the day being tied up at 1-1. We'll begin with the posted picture of the top point-getter of the day, Cam Ward, who shutout the Bruins, 3-0 for the win and earned himself 4 points. Those 4 points have now brought him up to being the top point-getter in the entire pool, as he now has 14 points in these playoffs. Not too bad for a player that was only taken 4 times on the sheet. Also having a good day for the Hurricanes was Joe Corvo (3 points) and Eric Staal (2).

In the early afternoon game on Sunday, the Red Wings and Ducks went into the early evening in Detroit, with a triple overtime game. Finally, it was the Ducks who prevailed early into the third for the series tying goal. The big player in that game was Ryan Getzlaf of the Ducks, who scored a goal and added 2 assists in the 4-3 win. Getzlaf, a Box 1 forward, was not taken at all in the pool. He is now the leading scorer among skaters with 13 points in the playoffs. All of his points have been going to waste.

Game-Winning Goals
With a longer list of games, we can finally break out the flashing red light for the game-winners. On Friday night, it was Nicklas Lidstrom scoring the winner late in the third fo the Red Wings to earn the win, while Marc Savard scored his first goal of the game in the middle of the second that stood up as the winner. As explained earlier, Lidstrom was taken 24 times in the pool and Savard was only taken 13 times. On Saturday, Tomas Fleischmann scored the game-winner for Washington in the third period, which gave 3 pool teams a bonus point. For Chicago, it was non-pool player, Ben Eager, who eventually got credit for the game-winning goal. On Sunday, the early game that went into triple overtime was then ended by Todd Marchant, another non-pool player, taking away another one of our bonus points. Finally, the Hurricanes shutout the Bruins, so the opening goal by Joe Corvo in the second period, stood up to be the winner when it was all said and done.

After scoring the 1-0 goal for the Canucks on Saturday night, Sami Salo left the ice with a lower body injury, not to return to the game. There is plenty of fear that he has re-injured the same lower body injury that kept him out of Games 3 & 4 in the St. Louis series. This is bad news for all 20 Salo owners in the pool. Of course, the team will have him listed as out day-to-day with a lower body injury, so that's all we'll know.

Tonight's Games

On Monday night, there is only one game going, as Game 2 will go between the Penguins and Capitals, with the Capitals owning a 1-0 series lead at the moment. Team leaders in points: PIT - Evgeni Malkin, 10 points, taken 13 times; WAS - Alex Semin, 11 points, taken 25 times.