Flirting with 40

[jRuutu 2,426]

Familiar sight in Vancouver games, Palo lighting the lamp

 

So close, I can almost taste it in my mouth. 38 goals is what my goal total shows right now when 66 games have been played. Question is, do I get to 40? Two goals in six games is not impossible, but when you also have playoffs coming up in the near future, at some point you need to think about taking it easy and focus on the games that everybody wants to play. Nothing worse than getting hurt in the last games when you tried to score a goal or two more to make your regular season totals look better.

 

Unfortunately, technically we could still miss out on the playoff train, so can´t take it too easy just yet, Toronto is the last team outside looking at the playoff spots - 10 points away from Vancouver, not a close race at the moment at least, but never know in the wild world of VHL. If we lose every game and Toronto wins their remaining games, Vancouver could be out. To be fair, New York is still between us, five points to Vancouver, so in reality they are the ones who are in bigger danger on missing out, but either way - focus needs to be at 100% for the next few games to make sure we get the points and secure a spot in the playoffs.

 

 

If we go back to my goal total and analyze it further. Not bad from the second line, I must say. Before the season started I set a personal target of hitting 50 goals, but I´m not going to hit that unless I go into absolute beast mode in the last six games. Missing on the 50 is not from lack of trying, I have 387 shots - the most in the whole Vancouver team! Getting the last 12 goals with 300+ shots that I missed is not an impossible goal either, too late now of course, but I had everything on my own hands, that is what every player wants, to be in a position where you can play your own game and produce.

 

I know quite a few fans have been commenting on how I should pass more to Jagr and Gritty, but to that, I can only say: naah - gonna shoot them myself. Jagr and Gritty are both young guys and they need to learn to be selfish. Quite often you see young players passing to their idols or bigger names when they are on the ice together when they should just shoot the puck themselves. I have not even passed the puck to Jagr or Gritty, so they can´t make that mistake of passing on prime goal scoring chances.

 

Still to this day I remember how my father used to check me really hard when I was just a kid and learning to skate. My father said that I need to learn to stay on my feet no matter what and keep my head up. If I don´t keep my head up, how can I know where the open net is? That is how I learned from my father and that is also how my father learned from his father. Need to take your chances and use them when you got a chance to do so.