Jan 08 If Montreal Canadiens Vs Toronto Mapleleafs Wasn't a Rivalry Before...

There was a joke once that went something like "I went to a fight the other night and a hockey game broke out." Well if you tuned in to the Canadiens/Leafs game around the midway point of the 2nd period last night, you almost saw what that joke was talking about.

First of all, put the "biggest rivalry of the NHL" story to bed. I'm not quite sure that everyone buys into that theory as much as the NHL hype machine would want us too. Sure I hate the Leafs as much as the next Habs fan, but I'm more of a Bruins Vs Habs or (yes, I go back that far) Nordiques Vs Habs for my top 2. No I think there were a few reasons that there were so many penalties given out last night as the teams combined for over 150 in total penalty minutes.

Reason number 1:  Chris Ciamaga and Tim Peel. Who? Exactly.

One would think that for such a high profile game between one of the best hockey teams in the NHL and the team from the centre of the hockey universe would merit some refs that actually logged a bit of ice time and whose whistles still had their wrappers on them. Last night's game, while some penalties were warranted, and others were highly suspect at best, was more a matter of "look at me, I'm a ref in the NHL!" more than anything else. You should have let the players play guys, and half the stuff would have sorted itself out. Really guys, 9 ten minute misconducts... really? and a bench minor when Carbo asked the same question? No, you ref'd a good game!

Reason number 2: The Burke effect.

So it has come to this. Brian, while it was mighty impressive how everyone wanted to be like the Anaheim Ducks, who arguably, were the toughest team in the league that Stanley Cup winning year in 2007, you forgot one thing: They were also an offensive juggernaut both at the forward positions as well as on D. Without the guys to put the puck in the net, you lose all your legitimacy and the team is nothing more than a bunch of goons. How many 25+ goal scorers does TO have on its roster?

Seriously, I mean you send a Jamal Mayers out to pick a fight against Tom Kostopoulos? Some people are saying Tom should pick his fights better, but I'm thinking poor Tom has to stop fighting altogether. His heart is in the right place but jeez Tom, you're looking like a punching bag out there. That fight forced Francis Boullion to have to go with Brad May, another bad match-up, but at least Frankie Cube held his own and gave the fans something to cheer about. Kudos, however to the Habs that seem to want to stick up for each other no matter what. You can't buy that.

And lastly, the Montreal castoff of Mikhail Grabovski who must have some pent up feelings for his old team and more specifically his old Belarusian buddy Sergei Kostitsyn. Or maybe he just couldn't handle that every time he touched the puck he was utterly booed to no avail, or maybe all of the above. But if he thinks he got booed last night, he ain't seen nothing yet. After all was said and done, Grabovski was asked why he wanted to fight Kostitsyn, and his reply was, "I think he is not Belarusian now, he is French because I never fight with Belarusian guy." Mikhail, I'd take out extra insurance the next time I swung around these parts of town. 

Grabovski ended up later getting a 3 game suspension for having pushed a ref (but I'm sure alot of players and coaches would have loved to take a shot at one of them on this night) but again, none of this would have happened if the refs were not so hell bent on preventing these two from going. Carbo probably did the right thing and yanked SK74 onto the bench by the scruff of his jersey, knowing that his player had absolutely nothing to gain in fighting Grabovski. But if you saw the whole scenario, a linesman even tackled Grabovski to the floor at one point to prevent him from getting any closer to the Hab. Why? Was the quota on fights attained in the 2nd period?

All in all, it made for lots of talk and lots of what if's. The biggest one being, what if big Georges were on the ice? Would this have happened? Well, big Georges is nursing his big injury that has not allowed him to play more than 2 consecutive games since he joined the team, but the answer is most probably "no". Georges, I hope you were taking down jersey numbers and circling Saturday February 7th on your calendar. It's a home game Georgie boy. Time to shine.

Oh, and by the way, the Habs trounced the Leafs 6-2. It was 4-1 after 6 minutes gone in the 2nd, approximately 5 minutes before all control was lost... coincidence? 

photo by habsinsideout.com

Tags: fighting \ hockey \ Mikhail Grabovsky \ Montreal Canadiens \ NHL \ Sergei Kostitsyn \ Tom Kostopoulos \ Toronto Mapleleafs