lordstanley

Glowing feature in The Athletic today about the turnaround on and off the ice of Utah HC. Have we reached a point as Wings fans where there's reason to be envious of the former Arizona Coyotes? https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6013288/2024/12/23/nhl-utah-hockey-club-future/ Andre Tourigny’s club has won seven games in a row on the road and is 6-0-2 in its past eight, 8-1-3 in its past 12 and pulled within a point of a playoff spot in the Western Conference Sunday with a shootout loss to Anaheim. This is no longer the Coyotes, where Armstrong’s edict was simply to meet the cap floor, acquire dead-money contracts for essentially retired players to help him do that and gobble up as many draft picks and prospects as possible. Yet because of the latter, the future in Utah is bright with a core that includes Keller, Guenther, Logan Cooley, Lawson Crouse, Nick Schmaltz and Michael Kesselring (who has soared in the wake of injuries to Sean Durzi and John Marino) and prospects on the horizon such as Maveric Lamoureux, Tij Iginla, Dmitriy Simashev and Daniil But.

Packers beat the Saints 34-0 in the NFL's shutout of the season. NFC North are 3 of the top 4 teams in terms of point differential.

North Vancouver’s Macklin Celebrini plays at the Canucks for the first time tonight. Any chance he will have as good of a career as North Van’s Connor Bedard? Incidentally, both Celebrini and Bedard are cousins by marriage with phenom Gavin McKenna who likely will go first overall in 2026.

So the “tough schedule” of October wasn’t the issue. “Schedule relief” this month has led to a December record to date of …3-6-2, for 8 points in 11 games.

GB leading New Orleans 21-0 at the half. With the Packers playing the Bears the final week of the season, potential for the final North standings to be Detroit 15-2, Green Bay 13-4, Minnesota 13-4. Imagine finishing 3rd in the division with a 13-4 record.

And I thought the Blues were having a disappointing year.

The ‘77-‘78 is what got me into the Wings. In fact I can nail down to the minute the moment I became a Wings fan. Coming home from hockey practice, 9 years old, my dad went into Mac’s Milk to pick up a few things, and left the car running with the radio on with the lowly Wings nursing a 2-1 lead late over the mighty 2-time defending Cup champs Montreal Canadiens. The crowd was into it, Bruce Martyn & Sid Abel were excited, and I suddenly found myself invested in the outcome. The Wings ended up giving up a goal with 16 seconds to go for a tie, but I was hooked. A new coach did seem to be key to the Wings’ bounce that season. Ted Lindsay and his “Aggressive Hockey Is Back In Town” slogan energized the fanbase - I even bought the t-shirt. Bill Lochead’s playoff series winning goal against Atlanta that next spring is the great forgotten goal of Red Wings history. Of course it all went to pot that summer with the Rogie Vachon-Dale McCourt-Marcel Dionne fiasco. https://www.hockey-reference.com/boxscores/197710200DET.html https://bleacherreport.com/articles/250882-the-dale-mccourt-saga-the-beginning-of-the-end-of-team-loyalty

My grandpa, born in 1914, went to Cass Tech. So this would have been late ‘20s, early 1930s. He got a job as a sweeper at Navin Field, cleaning up after the games - all matinees of course back then - finished up. Would take the streetcar after school. He said it was a steady job but was hired basically day to day. Once they knew you, you’d be hired day after day but if you missed a day there was a risk you’d be out of the rotation. So some pressure. He tried to get promoted to clubhouse attendant, and my understanding is he did not get the job but was asked to go into the visitors’ lockerroom a few times to help clean up.

It would feel weird for the SF game to be meaningless, although I agree with those who say it could be. I think it’s one of those games that has been circled on the calendar, after the loss in the NFC championship game. So it would be a perfect setting to wrap up the #1 seed, just need GB to co-operate.

Give Reynolds and the sideline Oscars for Best Supporting Actor:

The Lions are 3 home wins away from making the Super Bowl: Minnesota, divisional round, conference final.

Seahawks take the lead by 4 with 4:21 to go.

And even if everything goes against the Lions in the standings the rest of today and next weekend, it could all be solved “simply” by beating Minnesota in the final game of the regular season.

if the Vikings can lose to Seattle and Minnesota and the Eagles lose to Dallas, the Lions would have clinched the #1 seed by the time they play SF so their next meaningful game would be 4 weeks from now!

Commanders up by 3 with 6 seconds to go. Make them return this kick!

Was this actually an injury-free game for the Lions?!

The Rams win has eliminated the 49ers from the division, so a Commanders comeback win would be doubly nice as it would eliminate SF from the playoffs completely.

I had switched over to the Eagles game. Why did the Bears punt,lol. 4th and 25 is not impossible, it’s a longshot but so is coming back from 17 down with the Lions having the ball.

Crappy start to the 4th quarter. I would have kicked there, make the Bears score 3 TDs.

If the Lions score a TD here they should go for 2 to make it a 4-score game.

I like seeing actual kickoff retune by both teams today.

CJ Gardner Johnson gets ejected of the Eagles game with two unsportsmanlike penalties

That stumbling had to be on purpose.

Eagles miss a long FG attempt (56 yards) as the half expires.

Lions may need to go for some more points in these final 39 seconds.