Round one - too good

[jRuutu 2,426]

 

Palo vs Marleu

 

Most goals, most powerplay goals, most shorthanded goals, and most fights - if I would try to describe my performance in the playoffs so far, I would use two words - too good. Further proof of my dominance can be seen in the most game-winning goals category, listed as the number one despite multiple other players have the same total. I´m simply amazing right now, to those who have not watched Rauno Palo play in the playoffs, now is your chance, last time ever and look at the performance - unreal.

 

Of course, hockey is a team game and its true that without great teammates you can not win, but as the most experienced player in the league - I know when to take credit and when to give out credit. When you analyze round one for Riga and look for key reasons why the team goes through to the second round - the search starts and stops on the name Palo, did I do anything poorly? I don´t think so, even the 8-3 game where Marleau seemingly looked stronger in our fight was not something where I did badly,  just two different fighters and schools went head to head, street fighter Marleau who came in hot and started swinging before I even managed to take my gloves off and then you had me, the gentleman fighter who almost poetically moves his hands and never misses due to calculating every punch five times before actually throwing them. If anything, that fight shows the referees don´t have any idea what they are doing, letting that fight continue after a start like that from Marleu - unprofessional.

 

 

The first round is history now though, everything starts from the beginning, next we play against Moscow. The Russian team is a tough one, they beat Helsinki 4-2 in the first round and finished 8 points behind us in the regular season, so I´m expecting close series. Despite some of their top scorers from the regular season have not hit the net as often as they maybe hoped in the playoffs so far - they are still dangerous offensively. Jaguar had 85 points in the regular season, but ´only´ two goals in the playoffs, he is one player we need to keep an eye out, but Moscow also has solid depth in scoring, Baillie leads the team in scoring right now, Nano, Tocco and Gritty right behind Baillie, so we cant focus just on the bigger names, need to bring the A-game in every shift.

 

I´m confident in our chances though, the first round showed we in Riga can turn tight games into our victory and we also have a killer powerplay, second-best in the playoffs at the moment and Moscow in return has the worst penalty kill, but those statistics are not set in stone. Still, you don't have to be much of a fortune teller to say that the special teams will play a big part in the Riga-Moscow series, which team manages to spend the least time in the box is most likely going to win, interesting series coming up!

 

[Victor 10,830]

Should be a good one.