Game Day! Thursday in Edmonton

I may have to nap before the game, but I am looking forward to this one. Well, actually it's because I can't stand the three-day layovers that sometimes happens this time of year.

During that time of no Islander hockey we say Dwayne Roloson earn his first shut-out for Tampa Bay, the Russians win the WJC and the final episode of HBO's 24/7. We also saw Dwayne Roloson give up three quick goals, get pulled from the net, get put back in and finally lost 8 - 1. Yep.

Jeff Marek called it the Russian Miracle On Ice and for sure that is what it was. With the Russians trailing 3 - 0 through two periods, I (and everyone else) never expected five unanswered goals in the third to give them a gold medal and an amazing celebration. Just please remember these are teen-agers. Cut them some slack if you were offended with the enthusiasm.

Matt Moulson and Michael Grabner (whom if you are not following on Twitter you are really missing out.) were still making fun of John Tavares and Matt said he sent tissues to his hotel room because Canada's loss (i.e. winning a Silver medal while Team USA came home with Bronze) did him in. JT was a big part of the gold medal winning Canadian team. (Something fellow team mate Josh Bailey wasn't. Wonder how the kid feels about that.) Grabner's hotel desert looked fabulous.

I only managed to watch a few minutes of 24/7 last night but it was the few minutes that included the Penguins game at the Coliseum where they lost to Rick DiPietro and company. It was visually beautiful in the production quality. I'll have to catch the entire thing on demand another time.

As of last night there was no word on Frans Nielsen's ability to play today. I'm assuming we will hear this morning from Ms. Strang. Although, as we know Coach Jack does not believe in mandatory game-day morning skates, not sure how much info will come out.

Still hoping we get to see Kevin Poulin in net today, especially against a sliding Edmonton team. The Islanders have their three game win streak going and would like to extend it. Jack may feel that Nate has more experience to get the job done. His call. We'll see.

More as it arrives on my little Amish phone via Twitter. (What did we do before that? No. Really? Oh... right... waited till game time and for the newspaper to come out. OH the dark days of information delivery.)