Hoping Bishop & Co. represent and make their home crowd proud. Also in hopes that the 'Babcock is leaving' drama capitulates early and he takes the reigns here in St. Louis sooner than later. Wishful thinking to be sure, but boy would it be awesome.

You guys watching the game tonight? Who's big for you?

Mrazek can decide this game, either way.

Stamkos makes his "playoff debut" and Tyler Johnson continues being Tyler Johnson. Bolts 4, Wings 2.

MissouriMook wrote:Stamkos makes his "playoff debut" and Tyler Johnson continues being Tyler Johnson. Bolts 4, Wings 2.

I think (and hope) it's going to be a fantastic game. As for Tyler Johnson.......wow, what a friggin' stud he has been so far. Detroit needs to smother him, if at all possible, if they are going to win.

Lost in the news of the Kronwall suspension is that Marek Zidlicky is also out with a concussion, so defense pairings are:

Ericsson - Marchenko
DeKeyser - Quincey
Smith - Kindl

That's unsettling.

no, it's fantastic.

I hate Detroilet....so GO BOLTS. Hopefully Bishop is a wall and gets the SO.

I'm looking for Tyler Johnson to continue his beastly ways for the benefit of my BNF fantasy team.

Nice one-timer goal from Tampa to finally open up the scoring. It would be nice if any of our defensemen would try shooting like that. They always settle it, wait, look around, then float a wrister towards the net hoping it'll get tipped.

This is playoff hockey

Yes!!! GO BOLTS!

A friend of mine with zero hockey knowledge asked me to fill out the first round of his bracket for a hockey pool. I finished the round 7 out of 8.... Two guesses which series I missed... Ugh...

Congrats to the Bolts! Can we have Bishop back now?

ratonmono wrote:Congrats to the Bolts! Can we have Bishop back now?

If Vasilevskiy keeps progressing as he has thus far, they might not stick with Bishop long term.

bluetuned wrote:

ratonmono wrote:Congrats to the Bolts! Can we have Bishop back now?

If Vasilevskiy keeps progressing as he has thus far, they might not stick with Bishop long term.

True and really Bishop didn't have a great game in this series until the 7th game. You have to think Vasilevsky is gonna take over the reigns as soon as next season. Even so I'd take Big Ben back in a second.

bluetuned wrote:Nice one-timer goal from Tampa to finally open up the scoring. It would be nice if any of our defensemen would try shooting like that. They always settle it, wait, look around, then float a wrister towards the net hoping it'll get tipped.

Drives me nuts when I see a great pass and then the defense gets plenty of time to get into position to block the shot.

ratonmono wrote:

bluetuned wrote:

ratonmono wrote:Congrats to the Bolts! Can we have Bishop back now?

If Vasilevskiy keeps progressing as he has thus far, they might not stick with Bishop long term.

True and really Bishop didn't have a great game in this series until the 7th game. You have to think Vasilevsky is gonna take over the reigns as soon as next season. Even so I'd take Big Ben back in a second.

Through five games, Allen had a better save percentage, .911 versus .901.

Through six games, Allen and Bishop had the same save percentage, .904.

The two big questions between the two was if Bishop could perform in the playoffs, since he had no experience, and if Allen would flake under pressure like his normal status quo. So far we ended up with the choker, as usual. Allen trended down, Bishop trended up.

However, keep in mind Allen is four years younger than Bishop, and Bishop turns into a $6 million cap hit next season. Right now Bishop is probably the better goalie, but I think long term, and considering money, I still go Allen.

three thousandths of a point is trending up?

A shutout victory in Game 7 is trending up.

T.C. wrote:three thousandths of a point is trending up?

Cumulative save percentages after each game:

Bishop
Game 1 - 0.786
Game 2 - 0.895
Game 3 - 0.897
Game 4 - 0.902
Game 5 - 0.901
Game 6 - 0.904
Game 7 - 0.922

Allen
Game 1 - 0.926
Game 2 - 0.942
Game 3 - 0.933
Game 4 - 0.935
Game 5 - 0.911
Game 6 - 0.904
Game 7 - 0.904

roger.

Gm 7 worked out nearly perfectly!

Where is our Red Wings brother that posted in this thread ?

StL Dan wrote:Gm 7 worked out nearly perfectly!

Where is our Red Wings brother that posted in this thread ?

Over it, moved on to baseball season.

And Babcock-watch, I guess.

rbartnik wrote:

StL Dan wrote:Gm 7 worked out nearly perfectly!

Where is our Red Wings brother that posted in this thread ?

Over it, moved on to baseball season.

And Babcock-watch, I guess.

Here's a Yahoo.com article.

Mike Babcock faces the paradox of choice

It mentions he would like to have a plan in place in about 10 days. rbartnik, do you think Ilitch and or Holland would give Babcock permission to talk to other teams before July 1st if he wants to explore more options? I imagine you will be following this as closely as we will. I can't speak for anyone else, but I sure would appreciate any 'inside' information you can provide us. Even if it's not positive for the Blues, I'd like to know what's going on.

stlblues1226 wrote:Here's a Yahoo.com article.

Mike Babcock faces the paradox of choice

It mentions he would like to have a plan in place in about 10 days. rbartnik, do you think Ilitch and or Holland would give Babcock permission to talk to other teams before July 1st if he wants to explore more options? I imagine you will be following this as closely as we will. I can't speak for anyone else, but I sure would appreciate any 'inside' information you can provide us. Even if it's not positive for the Blues, I'd like to know what's going on.

Beats me. Completely speculating here, but I think they would.

Either he wants to stay with the Red Wings or he doesn't. If he wants to come back, they'll load up the Brinks truck and bring him back. If not, both sides are going to want to move on. The local news seems to think their plan B is to promote their AHL coach, Jeff Blashill, but I think that's more of a last resort. If Babcock wants to look elsewhere, it'll be Todd McLellan's job if he's still available, and he won't wait forever.

Babcock's not going to explore his options just to make sure he's getting the best deal. He knows the league, where the vacancies are and what they have to offer. It's not like Danny DeKeyser spending a week getting wooed by every team in the league before finally going to the team he was going to choose all along.