O! Captain, my Captain!

Dear Scotty:

What can I say about your amazing GWGs?? I miss seeing them in person...

Last night it was the Ducks V The Bolts. Tampa Bay have been riding well on the wave of amazing offensive players such a St. Louis, Stamkos, Tanguay, Lecavalier, and it was the same Tampa Bay team who entered the Pond. Anaheim were in need of a disparate win to give all of us in the Ducks nation hope that things can turn around. And it looked great for the 1st and half of the 2nd period where Ducks were in a 3 - 0 lead with goals from Selanne and Getzy in the 1st and Bobby Ryan 6 mins into the 2nd. All was looking great and the Ducks were control until 31 secs after Bobby scored, Bolts player, Jeff Halpern, wiped Hillers shut out by stuffing the puck through the netminders unprotected 5-hole which bounced off the inside of one leg, deflected off the other leg and crossed the goal line. I then thought "Oh man. Well hopefully that will be their only goal."

18 seconds later I would be shouting out loud in my apartment "Are you f--king kidding me?!" because Steven Stamkos would score an amazing goal after batting in his own rebound that was in mid-air when he fell down on the ice, chest up. It was unbelievable for two reasons, the goal itself and the fact that the Ducks let Tampa Bay score twice and once again, in only 18 seconds.
Anaheim would start the 3rd period out on a PK. Things were looking promising for that kill but with 20 secs left of that PK, St. Louis would slap the puck from the LW point and Ryan Malone who was moving in front of Hiller, would get a piece of that shot and put one in to tie up the score. And like that, what looked like a great game, soon started to look like the Ducks would let another win slip from their gloves. The boys would kill off two very important penalties in the remainder of the 3rd and the game would stay evened up til the final buzzer. That meant it was time for 4 on 4 OT. Both teams had a point but the Ducks needed that extra one for the full win. 4 on 4 would end up going 4 on 3 when Bolts player, Ryan Malone, got a penalty for cross checking sending Anaheim on a juicy OT Power Play.

40 seconds into that PP is when it all happened....

After the Bolts cleared the zone twice, I started to think, "This isn't looking good." But then Perry would pass the puck to Getzy who was at the LW point, Getzy would then move towards the RW switching places with Scotty and eventually handing it off to the Cap'n who then took his shot at a screened Mike Smith who was in net for the night. That shot would end up finding the back of the net, giving the Ducks their 3rd straight home and must needed win.
It would also send me jumping up and screaming as I threw my arms up high in celebrating the victory as if I were back at the Pond watching along with my fellow supporters. It felt great even though I ended up scaring my cats for a 2nd time that evening ( the 1st time was when Stamkos scored that amazing goal).

The feed of my Game Center Live was out right before they announced the 3-stars of the game and as I updated the stats on Twitter, I noticed that people who were at the game were tweeting about a fight that broke out in the stands over Scotty's signed souvenir stick. Giving them out is a new tradition for the Ducks this year. Teams like the Queens-um I mean, Kings and the Sharks do it already and I was happy that Anaheim finally decided to do it was well. As many already know, the stick in question was meant for a young girl but when Scotty tossed it over the glass, his aim wasn't so great, funny being that he has amazing accuracy shooting the puck, and it ended up be caught by another fan. When her friend/boyfriend/brother/I don't know... but when the guy next to her who obviously knew her took the stick, the guy behind him suddenly grabbed it in anger and then he put the dude in a head-lock and then all hell broke loose. The girl who caught the stick started punching the guy behind them who was punching the dude he had in the head-lock. When all was said and done, the little girl who Scotty gave the stick to, got it and everyone lived happily ever after. The video of the incident was put on YouTube quickly thereafter and I must admit, it's a shame that this all happened. What's even more surprising is that the guy who instigated the rough stuff was hardcore Ducks fan and pro-Skater, Mike V(Vallely). The little girl who Scotty tried to give the stick to happened to be one of his daughters and although it's good that he tried to make sure that the stick would go to her, I think he overreacted by doing what he did. And what's even more a shame is that the Ducks now have severed all ties with Mike V, who had his own blog on their official website, by which the link and blog have been removed. Even though Mike is really nice (I met him one time after a game at the Old No.7 Club), he's know new to getting into a scrap or two. If you look on YouTube, you'll find that he has gotten into a few of them in his life, but one would think he would've put all that behind him. Guess not. Here's the vid:

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Tomorrow night:
The Ducks will try to get another win when they host the San Jose Sharks. SJ ended up winning tonight's game at the Shark Tank against the Philadelphia Flyers, 6 - 3 and Heatley ended up getting another Hat Trick. Hopefully they'll be tired tomorrow. We shall see. It also has been announced that Koivu is hoping to return out on the ice for this game as well as Wiz, who got a bruised foot from when the puck hit him last night in the 1st period. Wiz didn't play the rest of the game. It was also announced that Lupul suffered a minor upper-body injury during last nights game as well. He also hopes that it's nothing big and will return. One thing is for sure, the hill gets steeper in the 2 game of the Ducks 7 game home stand. It would be great if they end up getting 2 points from this match as well.

Go Ducks!