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Weekend Roundup and Odds-n-Ends |
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With a 4-3 overtime loss to Tampa Bay, the Thrashers wrapped up a 5-game homestand in which they went 2-1-2 against teams that are a collective 56-41-16. After winning the first two against Los Angeles and Edmonton, the dropped overtime games against Boston and the Lightning as a 3-2 decision to the Stanley cup camps.
Their next assignment…travel to Motown to take on the 11-6-4 Red Wings, who are 7-2-1 in their last ten games. The Big Red Borg will play in Nashville tonight.
Saturday and Sunday’s games in Atlanta followed an all-too-familiar pattern…get behind by two or three goals, then mount a comeback. Against the Penguins, the hole was 3-0 in the third…Sunday it was 2-0 after two and 3-1 late in the third.
In Saturday’s game, the deficit was more then just 3-0 as Ilya Kovalchuk was gone for the remainder of the game following a 2-minute instigator penalty, 2-minute instigator with a visor and 10-minute game misconduct. The incident happened when Kovy took issue with Matt Cooke upending him and decided to take matters into his own hands.
Coach John Anderson had no problem with how his captain reacted. “I’m not allowed to comment on penalties and why,” Anderson said after the game.
"Obviously I didn’t agree with them”, the coach continued. “If you saw what happened in front of our bench, Cooke went by and slew-footed him. That’s what started it. At some point you have to say that’s enough. I don’t mind what he did.”
As for Sunday…perhaps Colby Armstrong put it bets when he said after the game…“By no means do I think we deserve to be in that game. Our goalie played great. We were brutal for at least two and a half periods”.
Speaking of “brutal”…there is the duo of Todd White and Bryan Little. The former has only 2 goals and 6 assists on 29 shots this season, the former has accounted for 3 goals and 9 points on 35 SOG and is a team-low –7.
The two are on a pace to earn 32 or 33 points. Un-good.
If there was one play over the weekend that kinda depicts Little’s season in one play…it came during the second period of the loss to Pittsburgh. He was wide open for a shot close in and fanned on it. The Pens then had an odd-man rush the other way…leading to a penalty shot situation.
On the opposite of that spectrum is Maxim Afinogenov, who is having a fine month of November so far. Starting with the 5-4 win in Montreal, Max has 6 goals, 13 points and is a +9. During the homestand, he had a 4-point game against the Kings, scored a game-tying goal in the last minute of the third against the Bruins and has played an electric, high-energy brand of hockey and has brought Thrasherville to it’s feet on many occasions.
That $800,000 has been money well spent so far.
Coach Anderson shuffled the lineup Sunday afternoon in the third…trying to spark his offense, Kovy was joined by White and Little for some shifts in Sunday’s game. Kozlov was then matched up with Afinogenov and Nik Antropov.
The moves resulted in Kozlov scoring the Thrashers second of three goals in the third off of an Antropov face off win.
Currently, Atlanta is 10-7-3 and their 23 points land them in third place in the Southeast Division and ninth place in the Eastern Conference. The Rangers, Islanders and Montreal each also have 23 points but have played more games.
23 points after 20 games played is a points winning percentage of .575, which is 8th best in the east and pace to net about 94 points of continued.
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