Your morning shot of hockey to go with your coffee.

LAST NIGHT’S SCORES:

Almost making the Friday in the afternoon a tradition. Doing Quick Hits again today. Here were my picks yesterday in case you missed them. Asterisk indicates who I picked

Flyers shut down Canadiens 2-1. – The Thunderblog business trip was a rousing success. Iceman may not be a Flyers fan but he had a great time live tweeting it:

Despite that, the Flyers played a complete game last night. Montreal wasn’t able to get inside and the Flyers were capitalizing on the Canadiens’ giveaways. Steve Mason once again played outstanding. The Flyers are actually 5th in the Eastern Conference in Goals Against with 86 GA and it’s all because of Steven Mason and Ray Emery. If they could start scoring more consistently, they could make a good run at one of the Metropolitan “Automatic Qualifiers.” The brawl at the end was exciting to see as a fan but I’m glad it happened after the game ended and not during the game. The dumb penalties were non-existent but that needs to continue.

Blue Jackets down Rangers 4-2. – The Blue Jackets went up 3-0 in the first twelve minutes in this one. That was enough for the Rangers to give King Henrik the hook. From there, the Rangers did outscore the Blue Jackets 2-1 but that’s not enough to overcome a 3-0 deficit. CBJ surprisingly streaking since Bob went down.

Senators edge Sabres 2-1. – Really should be called Craig Anderson shuts down the Sabres. The Sens’ Netminder made 40 saves last night to Ryan Miller’s 30. A defensive battle is what Buffalo wants to play but Anderson kept in in Ottawa’s favor.

Lighting beat Red Wings* 2-1 (SO). – Damn shootouts. Giving me losses left and right. Detroit has not been the team everyone thought they’d be right now. They’ve lost three straight and are only hanging around in the standings because half of their losses have occurred in OT or a Shootout.

Blues* blow out Maple Leafs 6-3. – Easy to see this one. St. Louis has one of the best offenses in the NHL and were able to steal the puck away from Toronto (13 takeaways).

Preds down Stars 3-1. – Shea Weber set up two goals and accounted for six of the 24 hits. There’s a reason the Flyers wanted to pay him so much money.

Avalanche edge Jets 4-3 (SO) – Another shootout game. Matt Duchene scored twice to bring his total for the season to 14. Colorado gave the puck away way too much and Winnipeg was able to capitalize on that.

Flames down Hurricanes in OT 2-1 – Carolina scored in the third to force OT and Calgary scored with :04 left in OT to prevent a shootout. West over East. No Surprise there.

Coyotes light up Islanders 6-3 – Phoenix is great at home and the Islanders are awful on the road. Phoenix has a great offense and New York has an awful defense. Seeing a trend here?

Bruins down Oilers 4-2 – Back up goalie Chad Johnson made 39 saves for the Bruins, Tuukka’s gotta be happy. Jerome Iglina sniped two for the Bruins and was assisted by Kevan Miller on one of them. That’s his first career assist, congrats Kevan! GO BEARS! Also, first assist to Jerome Iginla, could there be anyone better? The Bruins are now 8-2 in their last ten games, they’re starting to widen their division lead in the Atlantic.

Sharks* beat Wild 3-1 – All three San Jose goals came on the power play, including one from rookie phenom Tomas Hertl.

2-1 last night. 22-20 on the season now. I’m not out of the woods yet.

Highlight of the Night:

Fantastic. This was amazing to see live and even more amazing to watch again.

GAMES  THIS WEEKEND:

A full weekend in the NHL. Once again, I’ll give a game of the night. Tonight: Devils at Penguins, don’t really have to explain why I’m picking the Pens at home. Tomorrow: Bruins at Canucks. The Bruins’ road trip continues to face a red-hot Vancouver Canucks team. Just like last year in the playoffs, the Bruins will down John Tortorella. Sunday’s game will be Kings at Blackhawks. A rematch of the Western Conference finals in Chicago, gotta pick the Blackhawks.

The Flyers also play on Sunday in Washington. This is first matchup since this:

and this:

That’s the Caps celebrating the tradition of Ugly Sweaters.

It’ll be the first of a home-and-home series between the Flyers and Caps. The Key will be to keep up the defense and once again, not take any dumb penalties. Especially with Ovi on the streak he’s on. Keep up the physical play and hopefully you can shut him down. I say hopefully because that guy makes any angle a possible scoring angle.

Have a great weekend everyone and LET’S GO FLYERS!!