From High to Low... At Least We've Got Heart (and Class!)

After an emotional win in a shootout over the Ottawa Senators on Wednesday night, the Islanders stumbled last night against the Rangers, as a tired Rick DiPietro and a shaky defense let four goals go in- three of them by players who all had defined scoring slumps (Jaromir Jagr, Chris Drury, and Scott Gomez respectively, as well as a late goal by Ryan Dubinsky). Despite agitator Sean Avery out because of wrist surgery, the Rangers were able to dominate an Islanders team that has definitely seen better nights, but perhaps because of the emotion of the win the night before, just struggled on all accounts, including their continued trouble with scoring (Andy Hilbert and Bill Guerin both had opportunities that went wide, yet again). Unfortunately, neither the usually tight D neither Rick could bail them out, as they have done for the past few games. Next up is the Saturday night tilt against Atlanta, a team that has become extremely strong after Bob Hartley's firing- and look at Wade Dubielewicz in net for this one (if not now, never, most likely, seeing as Rick is simply too tired to start a 19th consecutive game, by the looks of last night- he was out of position, moving around a lot, and he did all he could but ultimately was not the rock in net that he has been as of late. The Isles still put up a pretty good fight (with Mike Comrie showing off his hands and scoring his eighth of the year) and all we have to do right now is regroup and get ready for the Thrashers, their first meeting of the year between the two teams.

On another note, I apologize for the brash tone of the post title, but when I opened the paper on the way to school this morning and saw the Rangers article underneath the game summary, and read about Ryan Hollweg's utterly classless way of trying to get under the Islanders' skin (albeit effective), my blood started to boil, because this proves that the Rangers have low-class players on their team; for every Drury there is an Avery, for every Shanahan, a Hollweg. There are players on that team on Broadway that I at least used to admire, and yet the fact that a player such as Hollweg, who would try to aggravate an injury that defenseman Radek Martinek suffered in a collision with the Senators' Antoine Vermette, has absolutely no qualms about doing so is disgusting. Honestly, threatening to rip out someone's stitches? That's not only bush league and irrelevant to hockey, but it's infantile as well. If Hollweg wants some respect, rather than do dumb things like that, he would do well to actually play hockey and score goals instead of check from behind like some goon. (Look how well acting like a jackass worked for Avery, who I believe has more skill than Hollweg, even.) The Rangers and Islanders don't meet again until I believe late winter to early spring, so that gives the Isles plenty of time to gear up for that showdown- although it will be a bit of a letdown for fans who like these games.