Flowers, Sore Groins, and Tanks: UPDATED-ISH

The Tower of Flower Power will get a chance to redeem himself Wed against the Ice T's (They're on Long Island, get it?). He'll be starting in net against the strangely resurgent Isles. They've actually been playing pretty good hockey recently, and I'm not sure why.... They're not the ones that got the new coach. The Raggers did. Yup, Tortorella has replaced old what's-his-name as head coach of the ever popular Rangers. I still have no idea why you replace a 6th place coach, but there it is. It's been done....


But enough of that stuff, let's delve into the ever fascinating world of the Flightless Winter Birds. It seems that El Capitan had to leave practice with some sort of crotch boo-boo. (not really sure about that one) But he's 'probable' to play Wed according to Coach Dan. Also in the 'pretty sure they'll be playing' category are Feds and Cookie. Evidently they were 'evaluated' on Monday, found to contain the sort of insanity that leads to sliding around on the ice with 11 other guys with sticks and a flying rubber biscuit, and therefore will be allowed to do just that.




Really, Really Big News That You Probably Already Know: Kris Le-tank will be on the ice and actually playing against the Isles. It seems that whatever Coach (Lieutenant) Dan was looking for, evidently Le-tank stopped asking silly questions long enough to show it to him, so CD said, 'Shut up and go play hockey' or something like that. Now the only question will be: 'Who sits?' Well, your guess is as good as mine, 'cause CD ain't sayin. He did say that he was 'a big fan of Kris' talent and skill and what he can bring to this team'. So you can stop freaking out, (Raine) Kris is definitely playing for the Penguins.

UPDATE-ITIS: Sidney Crosby will not play tonight against the Ice T's, his groin boo-boo is still .... well boo-hooing. He says that he was hoping to get less sore by game time from the soreness inflicted sometime Sunday but that didn't happen. He also didn't want to cut down the admittedly short time to practice with Coach Dan, but that probably didn't help either. Sid, rest your crotch, no more doing the Time Warp watching Rockey Horror (It's the pelvic thruuu-ust that really drives you ins-a-a-a-aaaane.. uh.... sorry about that), just get better and come back soon.

Ryan Whitney has bolted back to his homeland (Massachusetts) for personal family reasons for a few days and is planning to rejoin the team in Chicago, Friday. In a completely unrelated note: Janne Pesonen has been called back up from WBS. Vince, over at Pesonen and the Pens is so excited he's plagiarising Ronald Ray-gun. (I wonder if he does the voice too?) I think Coach Dan will give him more time on the ice that MT did, but I'm not convinced his impact will be any greater. Sorry Vince, he's a monster over in the Finnish League, but usually that translates to 'average or a little above' in the NHL. I'm not only willing, but hoping to be proved wrong, but it's going to take proof, not golden helmets and hype.

Other Goalie News: Martin Brodeur, or as we like to call him, Uncle Daddy, will probably be coming back to the ice sometime this week. UD says he'd like to be back Thursday, for the game against the Avs. Of course Sutter is saying that he won't be saying anything until Wed. At least he thinks he's saying that. But anyway, Uncle Daddy will be back sometime within the next week or 2 days, or maybe the second Tuesday of next week. So warm up the record books, he's only 7 wins shy of St. Patrick Roy's all time win mark.
Uncle Daddy Update: Brodeur will be returning to the Debbles net Thursday against the Av's. Clemmenson got the boot back to the minors. That's got to be a contract/waivers thing, because he was the one that was burning up the net while U-D was 'indisposed'. Oh well Scott, maybe he'll fall down the stairs or something.....