Though the New York Rangers ran away with a 5-2 victory on Saturday night to kick off the Sens season, I'm not ready to trade everybody for Craig Conroy just yet.
After period 1, Pascal Leclaire was looking heroic. During the simultaneous (and absolutely ridiculous) live blog of this game, commentors were flipping out. His play warranted comparisons to not just the greatest goalies of all time, but the greatest person of all time: Chuck Norris.
At 7:45 p.m., BT made a comment that may stick with Leclaire all season.
"LECLAIRE = chuck norris"
...and from there, it got a little crazy.
"If you google pascal leclaire, your computer gets deflected safely to a corner to be cleared away."
"PASCAL SEZ: "CHILL THE FUCK OUT. I GOT THIS."
"Pascal Leclaire can shoot a puck so hard even he cannot save it. AND THEN HE SAVES IT ANYWAY!"
"Leclaire does not sleep. He waits."
"Pascal Leclaire can kill two stones with one bird."
"New Sens chant? SNOO-PY! SNOO-PY! SNOO-PY!"
"There is no 'ctrl' button on PL's computer. PL is always in control."
...so I would say that the initial reviews are good. You can see all the live blog craziness in the post from Saturday. Although I wouldn't recommend it. Things got weird.
But it was sort of downhill after Leclaire's performance. The Senators defence looked weak. Chris Phillips and Anton Volchenkov (Philchenkov? Yeah, that would be their celebrity couple name) did nothing to restore our confidence in them after a poor 2008-09 season, and the rest of the so-called 'puck-moving' defencemen looked out-classed by quicker Rangers forwards.
Erik Karlsson? The kid has poise and moves on the powerplay, but his flaws were on full display as well. Maybe a few more games in the NHL will progress his defensive game, but I'm not sure he'll stick around that long.
And as for that new offensive depth... disturbingly absent. Jonanthan Cheechoo didn't make a ripple in the game and was largely unnoticable, and Alex Kovalev didn't bring too much of that offensive magic we've heard so much about.
Milan Michalek was the sole impressive newcomer (other than Chuck Leclaire), he showcased the speed and a some of the offensive talent that made him the centrepiece of the Heatley trade. Here's hoping it results in a goal against the Leafs.
And nothing would lift the spirits of the Sens Army like continuing the Leaf's regular-season misery.
OMG what a blog:
I'm very happy to announce that the game's live blog was a complete success. More than 275 people watched the madness, over 3+ hours. There were more than 1300 comments from the Ottawa Senators online community, and we demonstrated that coveritlive was not, as it clearly states on its website, intended for that many contributors. Fuck it. We almost killed the internet, and the lag was pretty bad at times, but it was wicked.
I'm looking forward to doing it again sometime. Maybe for the next Saturday night game. I'll let you know (email and blog-wise).
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