Dedicated to coverage of UND Hockey; aka the team formerly known as the Fighting Sioux. More specifically, WCHA, NCHC and college hockey news stories in general. I post stories on the NHL, to include my favorite hockey teams, the Boston Bruins and the Minnesota Wild… I will post anything that happens that’s big in NHL hockey, hits, fights and suspensions. This is also an unapologetic UND hockey site. This site has no official connection to UND hockey, but we have been accused of being toadies.
Speaking of clowns. This is a textbook embellishment. You can't tell me that a big guy like Steve Ott who is 6'0" and 193 pounds, should be able to be knocked over this easily, no way, it's not possible. This should be a penalty on Steven Ott for embellishment. I also believe that it's probably not a smart play by Flyers defenseman Oliver Lauridsen because he fell for the bait as well. Not a good day for the Flyers defender.
It's nice to see that the NHL "finally" gets this, and it's about time that the NHL starts calling the embellishment, fans are tired of watching players diving and flailing all over the ice. Diving is unsportsmanlike behavior and if the refs call this stuff, eventually the players will get the message and stop doing it. Now, it's time for the NCAA on-ice officials to get the message and start calling the embellishment. So hats off to the NHL officials for giving both Tyler Seguin and Steve Ott penalties for their embellishment.
Finally, the last thing the Boston Bruins players want to look like is the Montreal Canadiens and the Vancouver Canucks, who embellish up and down the ice. Think about this, especially, after Claude Julien complained about the Habs diving to the Boston media. If Julien's players are diving and flailing up and down the ice like the Hab's and the Canucks players, then he really doesn't have the moral high ground anymore. Does he?
Nothing makes me happier, than watching Hab's tough guy Brandon Prust work the Sabres tough guy wanna beSteve Ott like a clown. I guess if Steve Ott wants to continue getting pounded on a regular basis, more power to him. Last season, Prust had 20 fighting majors playing for the New York Rangers. This season, Prust already has eclipsed the four fight mark in a little over two weeks.
The Sabres John Scott is 6'8" and 270 and plays about 3:30 minutes a hockey game and has no other value other than he's a goon, some might refer to him as an insurance policy.
On the other hand, Boston Bruins forward Shawn Thornton is a role player that sticks up for his teammates and is also known to chip in goals. Thornton definitely took one for the team here.
For comparison sake, Thornton has scored (31g-43a—74pts) in 456 games, while John Scott has scored (1g-4a—5pts) in a 152 games.
First off, Dallas Stars hack Steve Ott is a jerk and if he never played another game in the NHL, it wouldn't hurt my feelings one bit. Second, there was no reason for Steve Ott to engage or say anything to Peter Laviolette, so what he walking down the tunnel to the locker room. If you look at the video you will see that Laviolette isn't wearing a uniform there is no reason for Ott to engage the coach of the Flyers.
After the end of the first period on Wednesday night, the Versus telecast showed Flyers head coach Peter Laviolette having some words with Dallas Stars center Steve Ott in the entrance to the tunnel. After Ott appeared to have blocked the coach's path back to the dressing room, wanting the coach to allow the Stars to go off first, Lavy gave Ott a bit of a shove to get out of his way. [The700Level]
To top it all off, during the second period of tonight's game Steve Ott continued to the be the jerk that he is. Ott was running his big mouth and chirping the whole Philadelphia Flyers bench. I mean, no one should be shocked by this, it's his modus operandi. Then when the bill came due, Ott was challenged to a fight in the second period by the Flyers defenseman Marc-Andre Bourdon, and of course Ott turtled and wouldn't fight Bourdon.
