Milwaukee with another key game tonight in their game number 74,against a good Hamilton team on the road,then plays them again tomorrow night. Hamilton has been hot,7-2-1, in their last ten and has taken control of the last playoff spot fight in the north division,5 points ahead of the teams chasing them. Milwuakee is something like 15-3-2 against teams from the north division this year,winning one and losing one in a shootout against Hamilton this year.(one of these days maybe i'll understand the AHL schedule)
Hamilton is a center dominated scoring team,with 4 of their top 5 scorers being their 4 centermen. Plekanec(25 goals),Higgins(27 goals),Ward(19 goals),and Ott(17 goals) have been their biggest threats this year. Ott has scored a goal in both games against the Admirals this year, while Plekanec has 1. Haydar had scored in both games against Hamilton. Expect Ivanans to look for trouble(severson/brown?...geezus i don't like either of those matchups)and Ott and Tootoo to have a go sometime tonight.
Hamhuis has now taken over the 2nd spot in scoring on the Ads with 50 points,tieing him with Kronwall for the league lead again.
Admirals sent Segal down today again to Rockford,leaving Brown(for Haydar) and the 8th dman Hanchuck (for Wyatt Smith) on the roster for now. Surprises me they held onto Hanchuck instead of Segal right here,even though it's no doubt temporary.
Ott is injured so there won't be an Ott vs. TooToo matchup tonight. Also, concerning the scheduling Chicago is in the West Division, but both Hamilton and Chicago are in the Western conference. All teams play their divsional opponents more then teams in the same conference.
Just to let you know Higgins plays left wing, with Plekanec as the center and Ward plays right wing, with Begin as the center.
Daley-Tootoo in fight, then Jancevski vs. Severson get into a fight.
tootoo continues his good play....with a partial breakaway thru the middle...and the first goal of the game..tootoo with his 9th,after the two assist game last time out..assisted by lundbohm and zanon
but...Milwaukee gives up the tieing one on the next shift...1-1
Hot damn...ads pull finley at the two minute mark..and in the 6 on 4 tootoo knocks in the rebound on the pp!...upshall and gamache with the assists...toots first two goal game (his 9th and 10th)
SHOOTOUT
Milwaukee Hamilton
SHOOTER SCORE
Simon Gamache NO
Jordin Tootoo NO
Libor Pivko NO
Tony Hrkac NO
Andrew Hutchinson YES
Andrew Hutchinson NO
Simon Gamache NO
Libor Pivko YES
SCORE SHOOTER
NO Corey Locke
NO Andrei Kostitsyn
YES Tomas Plekanec
NO Chris Higgins
NO Gavin Morgan
NO Tomas Plekanec
NO Andrei Kostitsyn
NO Corey Locke
TOTALS: 2 1
payback for that ****@$$ call on Adam Hall last year in Montreal that disallowed a goal, that would have given us a two goal lead ... ain't nothing wrong with being too strong on your skates
tootoo with the number one star,plekanec with the second one,and pivko with the third....might have gone with finley instead of pivko,but it's hard to argue with pivko getting the gamewinner
whether you like Montreal or hate them...one thing i have to give them credit for is their passion for the game....tonight's Milwaukee-Hamilton gamethread on their board...had over 5200 hits while the game was on...pretty amazing stuff
Good game indeed. Milwuakee pressed hard in the last ten minutes but Danis seemed to be standing on his head. Then the smart move by your coach leading to 6 on 4 advantage and they just couldn't remove Tootoo from the crease. Anyway see you later in the playoffs
