…and my question is do the Islanders have reservations for game 7 in Tampa? If so, they better cancel them :smile

Seriously though, the Lightning faced the aggressive attack from the Isles once again and for the 2nd time in this series, overcame being outplayed and put on their scoring show once more. Officials took a very hands-off approach to calling this game and makes me wonder how rules get interpreted in the Playoffs when a team is facing a top-media market? Do they become twisted somehow to keep the large-market team from doing itself in?

Martin St. Louis — man, if you see any goals Marty has scored that cements his Hart Trophy status, the one in the first period should do it. I really wish I had a replay to post on the site but alas - I do not. It was a defensive thing of beauty as Martin stole the puck and took it to DiPietro.

Frederik Modin and Ruslan Fedotenko rounded out scoring, converting slap shots on Slick rick… I was amazed by the fact that Rick did not cover them better.

This is the 4th 3-0 game in a row… Khabibulin’s 2nd straight shutout., 112-114 shots have been stopped by Nikolai…. And one has to wonder if this series will be sealed up before the Weekend?

From the Web Oddities file…

Reuters Science news on Yahoo reports, as one of their top stories, about Lightning

I don’t know if Boltsmag has any regular readers or those who know me from my Message Board posts know much about me… That being said, one of my favorite places to try talking about the Lightning is on the Usenet at alt.sports.hockey.nhl.tb-lightning. It isn’t filled with homers, it isn’t filled with Lightning Nation fans who use the mob mentality… It’s not over-run with Neo-traditionalists that think any team south of Washington DC should be contracted. It’s just a free speech zone and a good place to rant now and then and have fun with other posters.

Well, some asshole took that away from me.

As of Monday evening. alt.sports.hockey.nhl.tb-lightnign was a place I could view but not post on. This seems to be an epidemic for all Tampa Bay Road Runner subscribers as no one on this broadband ISP has access to the Usenet now.

I don’t want to go to Sunshine to talk, I don’t really want to go to Metroboards and talk… And I sure as hell don’t want to post on FanBone….

Game 4 is tonight… The Lightning could really put the Isles on the ropes with a win, but seeing how tough first round matchups are turning into - this could very well be the Isles game. My prediction is a scoreless thriller that lasts 3 overtimes.