Thrashers Eliminated By Bruins. Again.

Time to break this out again. See? Break? Ha!

EDIT: I goofed - I could have sworn that we were taken out by Boston last season too, but it was the Devils, two games later in the season. That 4-0 curbstomping by the Bruins just *felt* like the end.

Hey, let's admit something to ourselves as Thrashers fans. Boston didn't eliminate us last year. Boston didn't eliminate us this year. The Thrashers eliminated themselves in January of both seasons single handedly - slipshod goaltending, bad defense (Zach Bogosian is a -26 on the season. A MINUS TWENTY SIX), too many shots allowed from high percentage areas, too many shots taken from low percentage areas, bad puck tracking, questionable snap judgement - that's not just a summary of today's game, that's a summary of this franchise.

This year it's more frustrating than before. The team started the season off so very well, even leading the division at one point. And then Jim Slater got hurt, the team's face-off percentage dropped, and puck posession dropped. Compounding that (though I like the return) was the trade of Rich Peverley without getting anyone to make up for that face-off ability. When you add the fact that the coach puts people inappropriate to the situation out on the ice (Thorburn, Stapleton, and Schremp out during the dying minutes of today's game, and Stewart, Thorburn, Stapleton, Dvorak, et al are all often put out on the powerplay) and can't seem to figure out how to best manage his goaltending effectively, you have a serious problem.

You can point to the bad schedule in December. You can point at the defense. Or the coaching. Or the "give a crap factor" again. Whatever - it's a compound fracture and, like the eggs in the picture above, no one's going to put it together again. At least not until next season.

Luckily for them, the Bruins live to fight another day. Their chances of going to the Cup Finals are very high - so high I would recommend taking a trip to NHL Odds.