Lightning drop second straight, Smith loses control.
Friday, 7. November 2008
The Bolts headed out on the road this week looking to improve on their problematic play away from the Forum. So far, not so good. They dropped the first game in New Jersey 3-2 in overtime. Thanks to the NHL’s idiotic system, the get a point for an overtime loss. Does anyone else think this is as retarded as I do? Why should a team get a point if they LOSE?! Anyway, that game wasn’t all bad. Road game in Jersey and they were in the game all night. Last night was ugly. After getting lit up by the Rangers, the game ended 5-2, goalie Mike Smith lost it on Aaron Voros. Voros is one of those guys that plays in the crease and isn’t afraid to mix it up inside, goalie or not. Now I’m not sure if he did something dirty to Smith that I didn’t see but Smith was pretty upset with him. I’ve put the video in below for you to see if you missed it. You’ll see that Voros is playing inside as normal and Smith hits him with his stick and, everytime he got a shot, pushed and punched Voros in the back. After the play died Smith goes after Voros, pretty weakly I must say, and the fight ensues. I’m all for Smith defending his zone if Voros was playing dirty inside, but I didn’t see anything to make me think that so it appears that Smith just let his poor performance frustrate him to the point of the incident. Someone correct me if I’m wrong but I would like to see more mental toughness from our top net keeper. The Bolts sit at 4-4-4 now and need to gather themselves quickly as they still have three more road games ahead of them (Philadelphia, Washington and Florida). I do think the defense has been better but the lack of offense is killing everyone. They need to control the puck longer and be more aggressive in the zone. With Vinny, Marty and company we shouldn’t be in these close games or getting blown out this often.
Thanks to Puck Daddy for the heads up on the video (he rips the Rangers by the way).
