Hagman Beats Former Team in Shootout

"If they played the whole game like this, we wouldn't be watching overtime."

I had the wonderful fortune of bringing along some old co-workers to this evening's match-up, and that gem came from my friend about midway through the overtime session when it seemed that either team was bound to score. I couldn't have agreed more by the statement.

I don't understand the mentality of this team and their desire to wait until the last minute...or the end of the season, to start playing with fire. Ha!

Needless to say, this game seemed so chaotic to me. An overly bouncy puck, crazy line combinations and odd rushes seemed to dictate the odditiy of it all. It wasn't until Luca Sbisa had the grave misfortune of head butting (apparently this guy has no regard for keeping his pretty little face intact), that I was convinced this game wouldn't end normally. Ultimately, this game took a lot of out of me. I won't even pretend to analyze what we witnessed other than to say, at least we got that damn extra point.

Good:

- I'll go ahead and give Jonas Hiller some credity. Yes, it's killing me to do so, but he came up big on far too many breakaway opportunities. Not to mention, it's hard to ignore the goaltender when the game is won in a shootout.

- Niklas Hagman makes his way onto my list of good quite often. He was a hustling fool out there early on in the game, and it paid off as he was the lucky man to be credited with the game winner. I'm glad to see he's out there working hard to remind Bruce Boudreau what he's made of.

- It's great to see the Ducks winning face-offs these days. Teemu Selanne was 100% (4-4) in the circle and Saku Koivu, Rod Pelley, Ryan Getzlaf and Nick Bonino were all over 50%.

Bad:

- I'm sorry, how long were you on the power play?

- Dear Ryan Getzlaf, I applaud you greatly for drawing penalties, however, I curse you for taking a stupid crosscheck during the middle of a long power play opportunity. You're lucky the insanely frustrating "how can it be cross checking if it's also diving?!" question came into play.

Ugly:

- Again, how long were you on that power play? The Ducks have some serious issues brewing from these missed power play opportunities. A goal here and there (like against Columbus on Friday), and the Ducks just might find themselves coasting to a few more victories instead of battling it out in the final moments of every game.

- The game was sloppy and full of too much "pretty". This team just isn't good enough for all the fancy moves and drop passes they're trying to put into their game. Keep it simple and shoot the puck.

GO DUCKS!!!