Jackets vs Stars - Round 1 Recap

[MJK]

After a scare in Game 1 where the Jackets were outplayed and out shot, coach John Tortorella lost it and called out his star players. Since that game Rick Nash was the difference maker in the series and the jackets never looked back winning 4 straight to move on to the 2nd round. Nash scored 5 goals and added 4 helpers in the series playing on the 2nd line with Cleary and Morrison and that seems to be a good fit. It also allowed us to balance out our star players to give us 2 very good lines.

"Richards, Vanek and Hejduk did an excellent job shutting down their top players which gave me plenty of opportunity to score goals" said Nash. Morrison always seemed to find me in the right place at the right time.

The Jackets were not given many PP opportunities but when they had them they made them count. They also never gave up on PP goals which helped a lot.

We had two OT victories with Oshie and Greening as the heroes really helped build team morale. The game 4 hero, Colin Greening went out in game 5 with a pretty bad injury and he will miss the entire 2nd round. Look for Andrew Desjardins to get the call up from Syracuse to fill in until Callahan is ready. We hope to see Callahan in the 2nd round at some point. Obviously winning in 5 games we can get some rest.

Ryan Miller played OK but wasn't spectacular. If he can start playing like we've seen him play all year we like our chances to keep winning. He did win 4 straight and we'll take the wins.

Series Stars:
Rick Nash
Brendan Morrison
TJ Oshie

[silentsim]

i had already purchased round 2 tix from Dallas!! they are declaring no refunds!

[TurdFerguson]

Congrats again to the Jackets for their pretty convincing 4-1 series win. The line juggling that MJK did after game one clearly righted the ship and Dallas struggled for the remaineder of the series to find the solution to the Jackets new found chemistry. The Dallas roster really was not of the same class as the Jackets despite my attempt to bolster a boarderline AHL roster at the deadline though the acquisition of veterans. The reality was that Dallas struggled to find any kind of chemistry with its new players all series and simply didn't have the depth to deal with the 5 injuries incurred or the fatiguing of Jonas Hiller. Ultimately, I really didn't expect to compete in this series and for the most part I didn't.

As the Jackets head off into the second round Dallas will continue down the path I choose mid-season of a ground up rebuild through prospects and development. I have lots to look forward to with the players in the Stars system and will be actively looking to make moves geared towards the future. I'll try to provide more insight into this in a season review post next week.

To any people left holding Stars round two tickets, fret not as the Dallas organization will be treating you all to an audio and visual extravaganza like no other in a live event featuring both a tractor pull and live concert from Nickelback!