Subtle irony at the Honda Center.
Last Thursday there was a video tribute on the Honda Center bigscreen to Jacques Plante, the legendary goalkeeper of the 1960's and 70's who pioneered the use of a goalie's mask and was the first to roam out of the crease to play pucks. Taking a page from Plante, Dallas 'keeper Marty Turco more than handed it to the Ducks on Monday night.
The Ducks learned the hard way that Turco is one of the best at playing pucks away from his own net. Time after time, they dumped it in toward Turco from the neutral zone, and time after time he made them look bad for doing it.
Ducks coach Randy Carlyle: "Dallas has got a great trapping hockey club that forces turnovers in that area, and any time we put dumps in, Marty Turco had an easy night. As far as when we get pucks, we were dumping the puck and they were all ending up where he had a position to play on it. He’s as good a goalie as there is in the league as far as playing the puck. Those things really played against us. We didn’t seem to find a way … to change that."
Scott Niedermayer echoed the sentiment: "Against him, you've got to be smarter on the chip and the dump, chipping away from him, so you can get with the defensemen. We weren't being smart about that. That's an easy game for them."
Other stuff that didn't make the paper ...
• "The Chip" and "The Dump" were two of my roommates my junior year at UCLA.
• The 5-0 loss is the Ducks' third at home this year ... all shutouts.
• Ducks record: 6-8-2, T-2nd in the struggling Pacific Division.
About J.P.
J.P. Hoornstra has been covering the Anaheim Ducks since 2007. Eight months after the University of Wisconsin won its third NCAA hockey championship, he was born in a frigid Madison winter. He betrayed his blue-blooded beginnings by graduating from UCLA in 2003, and welcomes any and all dialogue on the finer points of hockey.
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