Nice little Saturday...

The Pens won 4-2 this afternoon at Mellon Arena against the Kings. Malkin had two goals and an assist, and was absolutely dominant up and down the ice.

We played another great game without about half of our lineup, and Danny Sabourin played well in his first start in a while. This propelled us to first place in the Atlantic and second overall in the Eastern Conference.

Next up for the Pens is a Sunday afternoon matchup with the hated Flyers. The puck drops at 1 PM...

The other reason I'm glad is one of my favorites, NASCAR, is up and running. Saturday night was the first race, the Budweiser Shootout, and my boy Dale Jr. won in a close race with Jimmie Johnson, Smoke Stewart and Jeff Gordon. It was his first race with new team Hendrick Motorsports and new teammates Gordon, Johnson and Casey Mears, and if Saturday was any indication, it's gonna be a helluva year for the #88 car...

Junior is my favorite racer, so you'll be reading about his exploits throughout the NASCAR season. Who knows, maybe it'll turn some of yinz into race fans...

Until tomorrow...

Pens win, Some links and Video Game of the Week...

Well sports fans, first and foremost, congrats are in order for our Pittsburgh Pens who defeated the Senators last night 6-5 in a shootout. Jarko Ruutu scored the deciding goal on an amazing fake-then-thru-the-5-hole move that left Ottawa crying in whatever it is those damn Canadians cry in...

Player of the game goes to Ryan Malone, who scored two goals and was playing every shift like a man with a mission...The fourth line also looked pretty good, flying all over the ice and hitting anything that moved...We also overcame two seperate two goal deficits, which is a good sign for this team that has had it's heart questioned in recent weeks...Maybe this will be the turning point we're all talking about when we win the Cup...Maybe...

YEA!!! Somebody other then me scored a goal!!!

In football news, yesterday's games were about as exciting as a kick in the balls...Indy, Green Bay and Dallas all won, and all won pretty big...At least Brett Favre and the Pack are a feel good story in this era of Spygate, but I still think the AFC's best would eat their children...

In college football news, USC stayed alive in it's bid for another Rose Bowl birth by beating the hell out of Arizona St...JD Booty didn't play as his name would suggest, throwing for 375 yards and 4 TD's...It's kind of a shame Oregon might miss the Rose Bowl because of the injury to Dixon, but that's the way football is I guess...

Today is also Black Friday, aka the day my crazy mother wakes up at 2:30 AM to go shopping...Jesus H is she wild, but not as bad as those jagoffs going to Grove City at midnight last night...That's all we need; a bunch of overfed, overdrunk bastards driving 100 miles to go fight each other for bargains...I also learned from someone who went last year that most of the people who go are Canadian...I swear those bastards are invading our country one shopping outlet at a time...

Blame Canada...

Finally, check out MLB Trade Rumors, as they still believe Ian Snell is on the block...I don't know why anyone in their right mind would trade someone so young and so good, but if it brings us closer to winning (I don't really see how it can) I guess I'm ok with it...

I am going to post a new segment later today called Snack's Video Game of the Week, which will let yinz know what game the big guy is playing on the regular and why it's so sweet...Until lata...

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Pens lose 3-2...and a link or two...

The Pens lost last night, 3-2 to the Colorado Avs...It was an OK game, with the Pens jumping out to a 2-0 lead, but, of course, the hometown Avs made a rousing comeback and put young Danny Sabourin in his place...At least Sid had two goals, maybe this and his four point game against the Wild will get him back on his usual God-like pace...

Hang your head buddy, hang your head ...

It looks like no matter who we have in the crease, the soft goals continue...I think we may need to get another goaltender for the stretch run if we plan on winning the Cup this year...Maybe a Chris Osgood sighting? And what ever happened to Moose, he'd be a great fit...Here's a recap of the game from ESPN for you to check out...

As far as last night went, we went to the William Penn Tavern in Shadyside...since Snack's back was in shambles he wasn't there long enough to review the bar, but he did notice low priced drinks and that the waitresses were pretty good lookin...All in all, not a bad joint, definitely worthy of your time...

For links, I'm only going to put up a couple this morning as Diego (hopefully) is doing a bunch of links and his usual Pens recap for this afternoon...

Hope you like re-runs...The Writers Guild of America is discussing walking out, which would mean production would halt on all shows using WGA writers...so basically everything but reality tv...God help us all...

Please, WGA, don't let this be all we see on TV...

Finally, it looks like Dog got ratted out by his own son, Tucker...It was Tucker's girlfriend Dog was going off about, but I think old Tucker's just pissed cause he's never on the show. His cage fighting, bounty hunting, Dog loving brother Leland is gonna beat the snot outta him...

Would you want this big-eared bastard coming after you?

Until lata...

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Dinner Time...

So it looks like J-Lo hasn't been getting fat...yup, she's preggo. And the best part is who spilled it and the sleazy European accent that it had to be spilled in...

It looks like the Pens will be going with Danny Sabourin again on Thursday night. Is Danny just more confident right now or is this the start of a goalie controversy? Stay tuned...

The Flower is a late bloomer...

In the "why the hell is your state slogan Wild, Wonderful" department, West Virginia changed their state slogan back to Wild, Wonderful! Silly, silly bastards...

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OG West Virginia residents...

Finally, in the spirit of Halloween, here's a link with Arkansas' star football players in their Halloween get-ups...Funny as hell...

See you all in the mornin', Happy Halloween everyone.

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Pens Win 4-2

The Pens won 4-2 tonight against the Wild in Minnesota, showing they put that overtime loss to the Habs behind them.

The first period of tonight's game was some of the most boring hockey I've ever seen. The scoring chances were few and far between, and it seemed as if they were just feeling each other out...Thankfully, the second period brought some excitment.

The scoring started at 3:30 of the second when Geno Malkin wrapped one under goalie Josh Harding for a 1-0 Pens lead. Sidney Crosby made a charge to the net but lost the puck behind the net, where Malkin took the puck. The Wild followed it up with a goal at 6:14 by Veilleux to tie it up at 1..The original shot hit the post and Danny Boy was a lil too slow finding the puck and made a lunging effort to save it. But 15 seconds later Malkin tickled the twine again, finding a rebound and slamming it home. Crosby and Malone had the assists on both of Malkin's goals.

In the third, things started off with an Adam Hall vs. Jake Sheppard fight that looked more like a slow dance. That punk Sheppard high-sticked Hall and then leveled him in the neutral zone...My guess is Hall said enough with this crap, I'm gonna teach this kid a lesson, but Sheppard wouldn't let go of his arms...Grow some nuts Sheppard.

Danny Boy let in a stuffer of a shot with a little more then 13 minutes left to tie the game at 2. The puck was just sitting in the blue ice and he shoved it in the goal. Peter Sykora gave the Pens the lead at 10:05 of the third on the power play with a wrister from the middle that found it's way behind Harding. Crosby got the assist on that one too, along with Sergei Gonchar.

The Pens gained a two goal advantage when Crosby scored on a break away at 14:29 and in doing so shut the door on the Wild. It was another good showing by Danny Boy in goal and Sid the Kid ended up getting four points on four goals, netting one and gettng three assists.

This is just the kind of convincing win I was talking about us needing earlier, however the Snackster was wrong about Fluery getting another shot. Hopefully this send us on the road to another 100 point season. We'll see... GO PENS!

PS: Did anyone catch Brian Engblom's hair on Versus? Good Lord the man looks like he's wearing a hair piece made of cat fur. Either that or a small marsupial fell asleep on his melon, I'm not sure which. He'll be on the 10 worst haircuts in hockey list for f-ing sure.

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Pens lose...

So the Pens lost in OT to the Canadians, and Snack and Diego were in the house...not a good omen to start the blog off with a loss, but hey, at least we got a point...

Some observations...

1. It was good seeing Sid the Kid getting physical...especially since he was scrapping with Alex Kovalev. It really got the crowd going and was the impetus of that two goal outpour in the second. I only wish he woulda dropped the gloves for the first time in his NHL career. Talk about bringing down the house, that woulda been front page news in every newspaper in Canada. I can see the picture now, Sid bleeding from the face like that poor bastard from Chicago who got his nose busted two games in a row.

2. Marc Fluery is as inconsistent as advertised. I watched those two games in a row where he looked like Patrick Roy reincarnated, and I had hoped all this was behind him...God, was I wrong. Those goals he allowed tonight looked soft and his confidence gotta be shattered.

On the same note, Dan the Man Sabourin looked outstanding in that shootout. I swear he has the quickest glove I've ever seen. I can't believe he stopped 5 shots in the shootout and still came away with the loss. Where did the vaunted Pens attack go? You'd think as talented as they are, they'd be better at shootouts, but I guess 1-on-1 isn't their strongpoint.

3. I was not a big fan of how many Canadian fans were in attendance. For a team that prides itself on selling out all its games, it seems a lil odd for so many fans of a different color to be there. But I guess that's what happens when you play an Original 6 team (except the aforementioned Blackhawks...no one gives a damn about them...). Thank God those Pens girls were running around the crowd to liven up the "atmosphere". And whoever Vinny from the X is, you better watch yourself...you might be the next victim of a Snack Attack!

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