The play of Kiprusoff is the main reason Calgary still has a (slim) shot at the playoffs.
One point ahead of the Calgary Flames, two games in hand. Then there's the big "but" --that home-and-home with the Detroit Red Wings that closes out the Chicago Blackhawks' season.
The defending Cup champs are running on fumes, shut out in two of their past three games, with just eight goals in their past five outings. Chicago has won just two of their past five -- both in extra time.
"We need more," coach Joel Quenneville said after a 2-0 loss to Tampa Sunday. "It's all got to come out. We have four games left and certainly we're looking for more. We're looking for more offence."
Give Calgary credit. We've personally written them off more times than our first car, a '74 Honda Civic, and still they have life. Now, Calgary is finding ways to win even when they're not at their best.
"Our goalie was the difference," Alex Tanguay said after a 2-1 win at Colorado Sunday, where Miikka Kiprusoff -- who has been soft of late -- regained his form. "There's no other explanation. Miikka played great and kept us in the game and gave us a chance to win."
And a chance, however slim, to be there when the playoffs begin on Apr. 13.
Jaw dropper
They bid farewell to one of the most unique old barns in Canadian junior hockey history Sunday night in Moose Jaw, Sask., as the horn sounded at "The Crushed Can" for one last time.
The Kootenay Ice capped their 4-2 series win over the Moose Jaw Warriors to move on to Round 2 of the Western Hockey League playoffs. For the record, Moose Jaw's Sam Fioretti scored the last WHL goal in the building, and Kootenay's Matt Fraser the final hat trick in a 5-4 win.
"It's a little piece of history we can take with us," Fraser told the Cranbrook Daily Townsman. "I can probably speak on behalf of every other team in the Western Hockey League -- that we're happy that we don't have to play in this rink anymore."
Has junior hockey ever known a better nickname for a rink than the one given the old Moose Jaw Civic Centre not long after it was opened by the great Tommy Douglas in '59? Trumpeter Louis Armstrong's All-Stars played there that night, which for Moose Jaw in the '50s was like having Taylor Swift visit The Soo today.
The rink was like the Saddledome in Calgary, or the old Cap Center in Maryland. But the low end of the saddle ran length-wise down the rink, so they could never hang a scoreboard over centre ice to chart goals by players like Theo Fleury, Kelly Buchberger and Mike Keane, whose numbers are retired there.
This is from the Wikipedia entry on the old barn: "The building shares the same parking lot with the Town 'N' Country Mall, Moose Jaw's only indoor shopping center."
A new rink is ready to open for next season and the Civic Centre is likely to be demolished.
They've Botta go
You've likely read where the three New York chapters of the Professional Hockey Writers Association have voted not to take part in PHWA voting for the NHL's major awards: the Hart, Norris, Calder, Selke and Lady Bing, as well as the All-Star teams.
They're boycotting as a protest to the New York Islanders revoking the press credentials of respected writer and long-time PHWA member Chris Botta early this season, with little or no explanation. The Isles have not relented, nor has NHL commissioner Gary Bettman intervened on behalf of Botta, who is welcome in the press boxes of the Rangers and Devils as a writer for AOL FanHouse.
In short, the PHWA exists to ensure proper dressing room access and working conditions for reporters, which makes it a strong ally of the fans. As long as we're able to do our work, you the fan can enjoy the access the PHWA helps to preserve. If teams can just eliminate reporters with whom the local GM may not see eye to eye, as appears to be the case with the dysfunctional Isles, nobody wins.
Least of all you, the hockey fan.
If you're interested, here's a statement from the PHWA.
The right calls
You think you have some tough calls at work? How about referee Brad Meier, who waved off two Anaheim goals in the final 2:04 Sunday night -- 76 seconds apart -- and replays showed he was right both times.
First he caught Saku Koivu interfering with Stars goalie Kari Lehtonen in a game led 4-3 by Dallas, disallowing Teemu Selanne's game-tying goal. Then Meier followed a puck in the low slot that went from a Duck player's glove, through some skates untouched, on to Bobby Ryan's stick, and into the net. There was Meier, perfectly positioned and making the correct call again -- against the home team, in a playoff race.
Dallas won 4-3 on a night where the West tightened up like a noose around the necks of the eighth-place Blackhawks.
Start the parade
For the record, I'm picking Vancouver in Round 1, no matter who the opponent is. Don't care who finishes in the No. 8 hole -- Canucks win.
But we did a radio show in Vancouver the other day, and the poll question was: "What would be a bigger celebration in Vancouver? The Olympic gold medal, or the Stanley Cup?"
That's right, folks. They're beyond planning the parade out in Van City. It's all about rating the impact of the overall celebration now.
As a colleague in Van says, "What could go wrong?"
Mark Spector is the lead columnist for sportsnet.ca
Follow me on Twitter.com @SportsnetSpec
