The game has been rescheduled to Sunday Nov 9th @ 1800h. The Senators play the Jets the night before (at home), and the Blue Stains play the Rangers the night before (at home).
Agree with the decision to postpone the game. Emotions aside, as Kardinal pointed out the commute home will be crazy, let alone having 19,000 people going to a game. The focus now should be to get everyone home safe.
Not sure when the Military appreciation nights will be this season across the league, but I hope that the NHL takes extra precautions for those events.
Even if everything was 'tidied up', I wouldn't want the game to go ahead today because it would be very hard on all the staff at the CTC to ensure that their security was up to snuff. I doubt that anything would happen, but the stress of getting everyone in and keeping them safe after the events at the War Memorial and on the Hill would be incredibly high, to say nothing of the extra logistics issues with getting all the fans to the game at 1900h rather than 1930h (national broadcast).
Postponing the game is the right thing to do, but I'm disappointed it took the NHL so long to make the decision.
As of right now (1450h), downtown is still locked down and the streets north of Laurier are all closed. When the offices start to empty, it's going to be mayhem and the 417 will be a parking lot for hours.
Dean Brown made an interesting point on the radio earlier today with respect to Cowen getting back into the the game lineup. If he is to come in, who do you think the coach should take out? It would be a change of left-shot D, and the others are Methot, Borowiecki, Phillips and Wiercioch. Phillips is playing well, and Boro/PW have been fine if not memorable.
If it becomes "who am I going to penalize with less ice time to get Cowen in?", it's the same question with a different emphasis and right now the others aren't playing their way off the game lineup. IMO, nobody's played badly enough to need to be switched out, so Cowen stays out for now. It's not a penalty for Cowen, it's a not-penalty for Boro & Weircioch.
1. I have a feeling that this game will be drastically significant for the rest of the year. If the Sens can win, they improve to 5-1 and the leafs fall to 2-4. If the Sens lose, they become more even in the positioning which could cause motivation and momentum shifts for the following games. Plus Ottawa plays Chicago twice this month so those will be harder games. Getting as much separation between the two teams as soon as possible is in our best interest.
Is sitting out Cowen this long going to make him improve? Should be not slot back in shortly?
Wait...so should we start a checklist?
- National Game
- ...vs Toronto
- Relatively important to the standings
All we need is for Toronto to start a rookie goalie!
As far as Cowen goes - I was wondering about that too vs. Columbus. Shouldn't they at least try him in the bottom pairing?
1. I have a feeling that this game will be drastically significant for the rest of the year. If the Sens can win, they improve to 5-1 and the leafs fall to 2-4. If the Sens lose, they become more even in the positioning which could cause motivation and momentum shifts for the following games. Plus Ottawa plays Chicago twice this month so those will be harder games. Getting as much separation between the two teams as soon as possible is in our best interest.
Is sitting out Cowen this long going to make him improve? Should be not slot back in shortly?
