1a. The win ends the team-record losing streak at 9 games and, more importantly, adds 2 points to the standings for the Boys in Union Blue. The CBJ are now 15-18-7, with 37 points and 8 points out of the final playoff spot.
1b. Here are the highlights. Savor all of it...it's been a while since we had the win:
2. The sense of relief in the Blue Jackets locker room must be just incredible. The quality of the win - a defensive showdown, a shutout, overtime - makes victory taste that much sweeter.
3. Freddy Modin pots the game winner on his own rebound in overtime. That's the type of performance that we need to win.3a. That's also the type of performance that gets Freddy a ticket to Vancouver 2010 as part of the Swedish Olympic team.
4. Steve Mason was ungodly good tonight. A true virtuoso performance that brings back sunny memories of the 2008-2009 playoff run. Save after save after save...and some of them were just incredible. Take this save on Tomas Holmstrom, for example:
6. The Nationwide crowd represented Columbus very well on Versus' national television broadcast. I was noticing that the non-Columbus residents in the Twitterverse were complimentary of the crowd and the community as one of the more underrated hockey towns in the NHL. True, dat.
7. The Versus guys put the Fox Sports Ohio guys to shame. What a professional broadcast, solid on-air announcers. It felt like a big-time game, even though the scoring was minimal. Some post-game interviews would have been icing on the cake.
8. Alexander Picard played strong. He and Mathieu Roy probably deserve to hang with the team for the duration.
9. Jared Boll's fight may have been blown a little out of proportion by the announcer, but it was a wild tussle. (And I liked the announcer's call of the fight, especially the "shredded jersey" line.)
10. As Twitterer JCBeckner said:
Blue Jackets beating Detroit is like the Buckeyes beating Michigan. No matter the record, it always feels good.And I'm not even a big Ohio State fan!
11. The Bonus Thought: Jason Chimera is gone, traded to Washington in exchange for Milan Jurcina and Capitals captain Chris Clark. Here's General Manager Scott Howson on the trade:
11a. Jason Chimera is one class individual who did so much good in the community. His connection to Ryan Salmons is the stuff of CBJ legend. He will be missed on a very human level, and I sincerely hope to see him hoist the Stanley Cup as a Capital this year. And I will root against him when he plays the Jackets in April. 11b. The Jackets get a desperately-needed top 6 defenseman in Jurcina. The loss of Rusty Klesla and the poor performance of Marc Methot made this component of the trade a necessity.
11c. Jurcina sounds like a character, with his leopard-skin skate guards and all.
11d. The addition of Chris Clark clearly is intended to buttress Rick Nash in the locker room. Folks, we finally have this season's Michael Peca - the knowledgeable veteran who will help keep the troops in line. Kinda neat that we get a veteran team captain as part of the trade. 11e. A classic win-win of a trade between two teams in opposite conferences. They get the left winger that they want (and a fair bit of cap relief), and the Jackets get defensive help and leadership (and a right winger!).
NEXT UP: The Jackets fly out to Long Island to take on wunderkind John Tavares and the New York Islanders (15-18-7, 37 pts., $44.235 million salary cap hit, Financial Acuity Index score +2) tomorrow night. I believe that Clark and Jurcina will join the team at Nassau Coliseum - not sure if they're going to play or not.
Photos from Yahoo NHL.
That was a great game and a BIG, BIG, BIG win. I hope the boys can carry this momentum into New York tomorrow. A nice and long win streak will help us all forget about that ugly 9 game losing streak.
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