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A Fight Can’t Change Momentum
by Paul on 04/27/09 at 07:52 AM ET
Comments (8)
from Chris Zelkovich of the Toronto Star,
First, we had the case of Pittsburgh’s Maxime Talbot starting a fight with Philadelphia goon Daniel Carcillo on Saturday afternoon.
According to almost everybody at Hockey Night In Canada, the fact that Talbot started a fight knowing he was going to be clobbered somehow inspired his teammates to overcome a 3-0 deficit and win the series.
Though analyst Gary Galley first said the fistic defeat would probably spell the end for Pittsburgh, he later agreed with his colleagues that Talbot’s impression of a punching bag had indeed changed the course of the game….
But here’s where the confusion comes in. That evening, the Blackhawks jumped out to a 5-1 second-period lead over the Flames.
They were dominating the Flames the way the Flyers had dominated the Penguins in the early going. Amazingly, Calgary defenceman Adam Pardy went on a Talbot-like suicide mission and attacked Chicago tough guy Ben Eager. The results were the same as Talbot’s strategic gem, a one-sided defeat – with one exception. The Flames didn’t score another goal and are now on the verge of elimination.
Filed in: NHL Teams, Calgary Flames, Chicago Blackhawks, Philadelphia Flyers, Pittsburgh Penguins | KK Hockey | Permalink
Comments
I don’t think anyone has said that a fight will always change the momentum of a game in favor of the team whose player instigated the fight. But there’s absolutely no doubt that it changed the momentum of the Penguins-Flyers game. For proof of that, I simply point you to Zelkovich’s own statement: “...there’s no doubt the Penguins players believed Talbot’s move inspired their comeback…”
Posted by OlderThanChelios from Grand Rapids on 04/27/09 at 09:13 AM ET
You should have read as far as the “Toronto Star” portion of Paul’s introduction and expected this to be absolute crap.
Posted by shanetx on 04/27/09 at 09:22 AM ET
I don’t know if that counts as proof OTC. Lots of players believe lots of stupid things. And considering that only five Penguins touched the ice after the fight and before the Pens first goal, and only one of them had a good shift, it seems just as likely to me that Malkin’s play started the comeback, not Talbot.
Posted by Ryan from Toronto on 04/27/09 at 11:55 AM ET
Why does it always have to be one thing? Everything is always caused by 1 thing. Why?
Why can’t the comeback have been caused by BOTH Talbots fight AND Malkin’s goal?
People can be motivated by more then one thing you know.
And to say that the Talbot fight had nothing to do with the comeback is just plain stupid considering every player on the Pens team cited it as one of the causes during the post-game interviews.
Posted by kstewy16 on 04/27/09 at 12:09 PM ET
Quick question… does a timeout change momentum?
If a fight does absolutely nothing else, it stops the regular progression of the game for a short interval of time just like a timeout does.
Sometimes it’s not a question of who kicks who’s ass in the fight, it’s that something came up which allowed one team to stop getting their ass kicked in the flow of regular play.
Posted by HockeyinHD on 04/27/09 at 12:10 PM ET
Flyers lost the game because they stop playing when they got 3-0 lead and decided to take stupid penalties. 2 of 5 goals scored by pens were pure luck.
Posted by FlyersFan on 04/27/09 at 03:13 PM ET
Flyers lost the game because they stop playing when they got 3-0 lead and decided to take stupid penalties.
The Flyers took two penalties after the fight and neither of them had any effect on the scoring. Just once it would be nice if you said something that wasn’t absolute nonsense, FF. Time and again, you’ve proven that you think just as intelligently as you write.
Posted by OlderThanChelios from Grand Rapids on 04/27/09 at 05:13 PM ET
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Posted by false_cause from DC on 04/27/09 at 08:24 AM ET