Sens at Land's End

No … that’s not true. That’s impossible! Noooooooooooooooo!!!!

If you are like me, you turned on your computer yesterday morning feeling cheerful enough. You went to dress your fantasy teams for the day, and noticed a little newsblast icon beside Alfie’s name. You clicked on it, then had a mini heart attack and shouted WHAT?!!?????! at your computer as you read that the captain will be out for about two weeks as he recovers from the surprise arthrosopic surgery he had yesterday to remove a bone chip from his knee. My gut reaction –

OH MY GOD WE’RE SO SCREWED!!!! ALFIE COME BACK! ALFIEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!

– has subsided a little. Two weeks. Not so bad. The team has a pretty light schedule for this week, at least, with only today’s game against the Red Wings between now and next Friday. And let’s face it, this team needs to get over its massive coping issues and learn to play without him at some point, so why not now? Maybe this is the moment when they actually figure out that hey, they can make it around the block without daddy holding on to the back of the bike the whole time. Sure, there might be a few scraped knees along the way, but this is what growing up and finding your own identity is all about.

In Alfie’s absence, Dany Heatley will be acting as team captain. I’m a little surprised he’s been chosen over Chris Phillips, but I’m of course interested to see how he’ll handle the added responsibility. He seems to have been thriving with the A so far. His first task will be to lead the team into battle against the defending champs today at Scotiabank Place. No pressure, though, Captain Heater.

Teams Who Aren’t the Sens: Columbus Blue Jackets

With my shiny new Centre Ice subscription, I watched Rick Nash and company take on Dallas last night and actually beat them 5-4 in overtime! It was very exciting! Nash scored the winner with about 20 seconds to go in OT. The Stars had a 2-1 lead after totally dominating the second — the Jackets got into some very bad penalty trouble and were outshot 15-2 in the period — but Columbus then scored three in the third to take the lead. Dallas was able to come back and tie it with two goals in less than a minute towards the end of the third period. The Jackets just looked like a young team that hasn’t yet learned to play with a lead at that point, and the more experienced Stars pounced on them. It looked bad, and I was quite surprised that CBJ was able to pull out the win. All in all it was a very entertaining game! I’m generally not one to heap praise on the NHL and their marketing people, but Centre Ice might actually be one of the best ideas ever.