If game one serves as a template for game two, what the Quebec media will publish tomorrow will say that the Habs outplayed the LIghtning and the LIghtning still won. Another distortion of just how the game was played

The Bolts came out in the 1st period and it was amateur hour. The Habs looked like they didn’t even belong on the same ice as the Lightning as the Bolts went up 2-0 rather quickly. Was it a case of nerves? Maybe Was it the gameplan to be aggressive like the Islanders in their game two victory? Perchance. Whatever the reason, the Lightning still dominated play for all of 5 minutes in the first period. Saku Koivu scored on a power play (outworking for the goal) to make the score 2-1.

The 2nd period is where the Quebe media willesee the entire game. The Habs defense was spectacular, keeping the Lightning from making many opportunities, while both teams went back and forth over and over again. The only problem with the 2nd periodd was that, it seemed, eveyone on Les Habs knew there wasn’t much time left and stopped playing all out. Vincent Lecavalier capitalized on that mistake and the score went to 3-1

The third period returned to the Lightning’s favor but the solid defense held up… Solid two way play on both sides and a running brooding from both teams.

The Lightning head to Quebec to play in one of Hockey’s most hollowed cities for games 3 and 4… Unlike all their previous visits, this will be in the playoffs.

…Which will lead to reports from the Quebec media that the Lightning haven’t played in Montreal before. Just you wait… :rolleyes

Usually I don’t hand out much respect for Phil Esposito. I do thank him for bringing Hockey to Tampa Bay but I really believe part of what went wrong with the Lightning was his insistence on having veterans on the roster and not young guys with upside…

I mean, Ives Racine? Paul Ysebart? Trading away five draft picks for Renberg? Bill Ranford? Etc, etc, etc…

But Phil left us one thing that I truly, greatly and deeply appreciate, and that is the draft class of 1998…

Oh, the Lecavalier pick was a gimmie so I don’t give him too many props for that, and the Brad Richards pick was at Lecavalier’s urging which is also a bit of a cop out… but there were two more picks that have cracked the Lightning lineup this year and at least one of them seems like a future mainstay on the roster. Those picks are Dmitry Afansenkov and Martin Cibak.

Of the previous 3 drafts before 1998 — only 3 players remain with the Lightning (and one of them did not break into the NHL with the Lightning — Shane Willis). Look over the draft classes and out of all of them, a few names stand out but for the most part - the draft and Phil’s overseeing of it had been dismal.

Of course, someone will jump up and say he liked what Phil did better than anything Rick Dudley did but I ask — who put most of the current players on the roster on the team? Richards was signed by Dudley, Modin and St. Louis were both Dudley acquisitions as was Tim Taylor and Dave Andreychuk. I don’t know when Cibak or Afansenkov signed but compared to how many of the past players (under Espo’s tenure) remained with the Lightning, I’m willing to be Dudley was More likely to have signed these players than Espo.

At any rate, i give thanks to Phil for having one good draft year out of the 7 he oversaw…. I don’t question your passion for this team and how it is indeed your baby and your creation… I just think you were a lousy Gm. No offense.

The Canadian media, not having Vincent Lecavalier trade rumors to work with during the Lightning vs. Habs playoff series, have decided to lay into Tampa Bay for not selling out their playoff game versus Les Habs on Friday.

Yes, it’s an attendance epidemic of course,… Tampa Bay doesn’t deserve a hockey team and blah-blah-blah, yada-yada-yada, so sayeth the Ultra-traditionalists in Hockey who can’t stand teams that are in non-traditional markets. The same garbage I have been hearing since the Lightning started playing poorly in 1996-97 till last season.

What I’d like to know is, where are these Ultra-Traditionalists when the New Jersey Devils — The reigning Stanley Cup Champions — failed to sell out playoff games? Where were the Ultra-traditionalists when Boston failed to sell out playoff hockey games versus New Jersey last season? Where were these Ultra-traditionalists when the Ottawa Senators failed to sell out playoff hockey games last season?

Frankly, you guys are full of shit.

If you want to focus on the ticket sale “problem” in Tampa Bay, you need to include every market in the league that fails to sell out nightly (the Ultra-traditionalist standard, by way of Montreal, Quebec and Toronto, Ontario ). Never could there be a problem with ticket prices because EVERYONE should be willing to pay high ticket prices to attend hockey games. This is a great sport after all and it’s not like pricing out people happens:rolleyes

Yes, that’s right folks — pricing out people is the real attendance epidemic in the National Hockey League. Between ownership greed in the past and player greed in the present, people are being priced out of attending hockey games — especially playoff hockey games where currently prices at St. Pete Times Forum are at a 75 percent increase over the regular season average. All but the elite / die hard crowd are able to afford tickets and people much like myself find themselves priced out, or forced to wait at 1 AM on gameday to buy a small number of nosebleeder, 8 dollar tickets that go on sale at 9 AM.

Why would fans do that? Because they refuse to pay 60 bucks for upper deck tickets in the corner. Any other sport charges less for playoff tickets that are at a distance from the game and Hockey prices out the people who would buy these tickets on the norm.

I honestly want to argue about the NFL system compared to the NHL system but the contrast between the two is huge — 65+ thousand seats are within the average NFL stadium while the average NHL arena has 20 thousand seats. You could get tickets to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2003, good tickets in the lower bowl to see the Super Bowl Champions, for about 60 dollars…

In the playoffs you are asking people in the NHL to pony up twice that to sit in the lower bowl of a hockey arena - and those are the cheapest seats in the lower bowl. You have priced out how many regular season game attendees by doing this?

Yes, there’s a serious attendance problem in Tampa Bay and it’s not the fact we’re a non-traditional market. The team and the league is bad at pricing out fans, terrible at pricing out minorities and extremely bad at marketing our games because of it. And lo and behold - it’s an epidemic in the United States in general if not all of North America and not just here. Even if Ultra-traditionalists can’t see past the geography of the problem.

So enough of my rant, lets go back to the Vincent Lecavalier trade rumors, because the flock-of-seagulls crowd from the great white north are exceedingly good at making that shit up too.