Even without the added mileage of the Hawks series, San Jose still takes the Blues because of their power play matching up with the Blues' plentiful dumb penalties.

As for Blues fandom, here's where I'm at. Naturally, I'm glad to see them fail again like they always do. 40 eliminations in 48 seasons is quite something. But St. Louis has always been a tenuous hockey market, more than you'd ever imagine at first glance, and I think that kinda sucks, because an old-growth midwestern city like St. Louis should be a rock-solid hockey town. It's not: ownership has been taking such a bath on the Blues that they had to hock their AHL affiliate in Peoria to the Canucks just to keep the Blues afloat. Christ, AHL franchises don't even cost that much; Dr. Ken and JORR could head up a group to buy a team and rename them the Champaign Fighting Bag-Heads.

My hope is that with this deep run and the Rams finally gone, interest in hockey can really grow to where it needs to be. In short, I wish them well so that their shortcomings will hurt more.

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Fuck them. I hope they move to Amarillo.

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

Good on ya Dougie Wilson!!!

They almost moved to Saskatoon because Ralston-Purina (which itself bought the team to save them from moving somewhere else) threw the keys on the table and said "fuck this, we're not funding this stupid hockey team anymore." As a result, the Blues had no picks in the 1983 entry draft, not because they were being punished, but because practically speaking, there was no St. Louis Blues organization to do the drafting. Eventually, some other guy bought the team to keep them in St. Louis until he got tired of it and sold them. This is the entire story of the Blues. The Blues are to billionaires and corporations what a boat is to an overextended middle-class family.

Pittsburgh has been pretty much the same story, except they won.

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Blues fortunes can't be helped by the recent Blackhawks run. Kids in downstate Illinois are going to identify with the winning team 6 hours away rather than the also-rans across the river.

0-0 after the 1st.

I'm seeing a handful of Blackhawks/Packers/Brewers fans back up in Wisconsin. I guess the fact that there's no Milwaukee team (because of Bill Wirtz) makes them a safe Chicago team to bandwagon on.

Fandom not expanding far beyond the metropolitan area is part of what killed the St. Louis Rams. Most of Illinois east of St. Louis goes Bears, most of Missouri west of it goes Chiefs, creating weird Cardinals/Bears or Cardinals/Chiefs overlaps and leaving Rams games as little more than a place to come watch the road team.

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St Louis is a strange town. People from there give off a weird vibe when you meet them out in the wild.

College sports big in Missouri? Could have that southern state thing going on where NCAA teams are popular enough that they make it tough for pro franchises in the area. I don't think that's the case but then I try to avoid Missouri as much as possible.

1-0 penguins. another goal or two by Pittsburgh and the Lightning will have em right where they want em.

this game got exciting fast. 1-0 Penguins became 1-1 and a minute later Pens back up 2-1.

they don't make game 7's like they used to.

That second pens goal was a tight opening.

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Elections have consequences.

Lightning would be lucky to get out of this period only down 2-1.

Like their chances to win if that's the score going into the 3rd.

Pittsburgh has jump that TB just can't handle.

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Same sex, different habits - who gives a fucking shit
This won't make the species unfurl

Seems like Tampa very rarely gets a chance to "set up" in the off zone like Pens can.

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Elections have consequences.

Lightning close out the period without Pens increasing their lead. still 2-1.

Hope the refs let em play the 3rd period and don't hand the game to either team. Lightning probably owed an even up PP, seeing as Pittsburgh has had 4 PP's to the Lightning's 1. Maybe they'll give Tampa an early PP chance.

yeah, most of the Lightning's scoring in this series has been coming on rushes and those stretch pass plays they like to do to get behind the defense. which leads to the Lightning getting goals taken off the board for off-sides.

So far reminiscent of G6 SCF Hawks/Flyers where Hawks tried holding on dear life in the 3rd and then Flyers tied it with 4 minutes or so left.

St. Louis is the actual "overgrown small town" that people accuse Chicago of being. High school cliques last for life down there and stuff. I think the weirdest thing about it was seeing it majestically come up on the horizon as you're approaching, only to get over the river and find yourself in what's basically Peoria with a croquet wicket.

From my casual anthropological fieldwork in mid-MO, people really really like the Cardinals, and grocery store employees all have special dispensation to wear Chiefs gear on gamedays, but I never got the feeling that watching sports was an all-consuming passion down there. Most likely, people are just into hunting deer and varmints. Regular Reader has a son at Mizzou and could lend his insight but he's gonna stumble into Winnetka before he stumbles into a Pittsburgh Penguins/Tampa Bay Lightning thread.

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Refs have swallowed their whistles.

Lightning need to pull an Islanders and start pulling down Penguins at any opportunity available.

What are the Lightning's defensemen doing when the puck's in the zone? every time it goes toward the blue line, neither of them are anywhere near it and it goes out of the zone

as they should. rather let them play a 3rd period in a game 7 like it's OT. other than the delay of game type penalty, which there was one against Tampa in this period.

Tampa not getting a make up PP in the 3rd, so it'll end with the Pens getting 5 PP's to Tampa's 1 in this game. I think those are the totals. didn't make too much of a difference, as neither team converted on their PP chances.

Why the heck did Cooper wait until 1:12 to pull Vasilevskiy? They were comfortably in Pens zone with two minutes left. Dumb

Penguins win, they should give em the Stanley Cup now.

Lightning did well to push Pittsburgh to a game 7 missing their starting goalie and Stamkos for almost all of the series.

The Hawks screwed up in not pursuing Drouin, but so did 28 other teams, so it's not such a big deal. I wonder where Stamkos goes now. I can see Anaheim if the math works.

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Yzerman should've traded Stamkos back in January, for all the good he did the Lightning in the playoffs.

If Datsyuk retires and the Wings can unload his cap hit on another team, they'll make a run at Stamkos. Dunno if he's gonna wanna play for a team that's probably not gonna contend any time soon tho.

Game 1: San Jose Sharks vs. Pittsburgh Penguins Mon. May 30 Pittsburgh 8 p.m. ET
Game 2: San Jose Sharks vs. Pittsburgh Penguins Wed. June 1 Pittsburgh 8 p.m. ET
Game 3: Pittsburgh Penguins vs. San Jose Sharks Sat. June 4 San Jose 8 p.m. ET
Game 4: Pittsburgh Penguins vs. San Jose Sharks Mon. June 6 San Jose 8 p.m. ET
Game 5: San Jose Sharks vs. Pittsburgh Penguins Thurs. June 9 Pittsburgh 8 p.m. ET
Game 6: Pittsburgh Penguins vs. San Jose Sharks Sun. June 12 San Jose 8 p.m. ET
Game 7: San Jose Sharks vs. Pittsburgh Penguins Wed. June 15 Pittsburgh 8 p.m. ET

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

Penguins in 5.

I look forward to not watching

Penguins in 6.

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Good people drink good beer - Hunter S. Thompson

<º)))><

Waiting for the time when I can finally say
That this has all been wonderful, but now I'm on my way