Habs entertain Caps in encounter between struggling clubs

Hockey Betting Lines

02/20/2007 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Montreal Canadiens will try to post back-to-back wins for the first time in a month as they welcome the Washington Capitals for tonight's showdown at the Bell Centre.

The Canadiens ended a six-game losing streak Sunday by posting a 3-2 victory in Columbus. Jaroslav Halak made 31 saves in his NHL debut to guide Montreal to the close win at Nationwide Arena. Saku Koivu, Michael Ryder and Francis Bouillon all scored for the Canadiens.

Halak was called into action after Cristobal Huet suffered a hamstring tear in Montreal's 5-2 loss at New Jersey on Wednesday. Huet had surgery to repair the tear on Sunday and will be out indefinitely.

Montreal has fallen into a tie with Toronto and the New York Islanders for the eighth and final postseason berth in the Eastern Conference. All three teams have 66 points on the year.

The Capitals have lost three straight games and are coming off a close defeat in Pittsburgh on Sunday. Mark Recchi, Evgeni Malkin and Maxime Talbot registered goals as Sidney Crosby's Penguins outlasted Alexander Ovechkin and the Caps by a 3-2 count.

Crosby finished with only an assist and Ovechkin went without a point, a bit of an anti-climactic outcome to the anticipated duel between the NHL's top two young stars.

Richard Zednik and Alexander Semin had the goals for Washington, while Brent Johnson finished with 23 stops.

Ovechkin, who leads Washington in goals (34) and assists (38), has gone two straight games without a point and has just one goal and one helper over his last seven tests.

The Capitals have dropped to 14th place in the East and are trailed only by the Philadelphia Flyers.

Tonight marks the end of a three-game road trip for Washington, which is just 9-15-5 away from D.C. this year and has lost six straight and 12 of its last 13 as the visitor.

Montreal and Washington have split a pair of meetings this year, but the Habs have taken six of the last 10 matchups. The Capitals have also walked away defeated in three of their last four trips to Montreal.

Wwwthriveonline Hockey Betting News

<< Murray goes for win No. 600 as Senators host Oilers
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Two teams headed in different directions face off tonight at Ottawa's Scotiabank Place, where the Senators wrap up a three-game homestand with a matchup against the slumping Edmonton Oilers. Ottawa has won the first two ga

<< Wild try to end futility against Dallas
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Minnesota Wild will try to stop their longest current losing streak against any team in the league when they host the Dallas Stars this evening at Xcel Energy Center for the final time this season. Minnesota has droppe

<< Nuggets, Spurs clash in San Antonio
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The San Antonio Spurs have recovered from their eight-game road trip and return to the AT&T Center this evening to host the Denver Nuggets. San Antonio, which is second in the Southwest standings, went 4-4 on the swing a

<< Pistons visit Central Division-rival Milwaukee
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Central Division-leading Detroit Pistons try to get back on the winning track tonight when they hit the road to visit the Milwaukee Bucks at the Bradley Center. Detroit had its seven-game winning streak halted with las

<< Argonauts ink QB McMahon
Toronto, Ontario (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Toronto Argonauts signed former NFL quarterback Mike McMahon on Tuesday. In 29 career NFL games, spread over five seasons with Detroit and Philadelphia, McMahon completed 229 of 515

Rangers, Devils open home-and-home series in New Jersey >>
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The New York Rangers and New Jersey Devils begin an important home-and-home series this evening, with the first of the consecutive meetings to take place at Continental Airlines Arena. These two games carry importance for

Lightning try to rebound against Panthers >>
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The first-place Tampa Bay Lightning will attempt to avenge a weekend loss to the Florida Panthers when the Southeast Division rivals complete a home-and-home series tonight at St. Pete Times Forum. Florida got the upper ha

Line of Scrimmage: Norv Turner - Bad Things Happen in Threes >>
Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - They're rejoicing in Denver, Kansas City, and Oakland right about now. Norv Turner is an NFL head coach for the third time, having taken over for Marty Schottenheimer in San Diego, and the rest of the AFC

Martin comes up big both on track and off >>
Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Mark Martin won the 2007 Daytona 500. Sure, he didn't get the trophy, the huge check or drenched by champagne in Victory Lane, but that doesn't change the fact that he won the race. In typical N

Jazz have what it takes to hold on in Northwest Division >>
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Utah (35-17) is in first place in the Northwest Division, 8 1/2 games ahead of the second place Denver Nuggets. Led by All- Stars Carmelo Anthony and Allen Iverson, the Nuggets will be primed to make a run at the Jazz.

FOOTBALL TRASH TALK

NFL Football Trash Talk

Trash talk has a place in every competitive endeavor (except baseball; those stirrup-wearers are too busy chewing on their sunflower seeds and their supplements to worry about what their opponents are doing).

Fantasy sports is no exception. Any intelligent discussion of the subject would probably start with a thesis statement or a definition of terms. Thankfully, this wont be an intelligent discussion.

Let me just say that I am happy to take a place in this space alongside my talented colleagues, even our commissioner. (You should see how she bleats like a demented paper boy about league fees on our fantasy site).

Trash talking, I would argue, is primarily about amusing your friends, their sheeplike demeanors and sloping foreheads notwithstanding. The best place I have found for football trash talking is at www.SportsAlarm.com.

Beyond the entertainment factor, though, I would recognize that the sophomoric ritual has one advantage, when properly applied. It magnifies your fantasy triumphs and mitigates your fantasy failures by transforming the eventual point total into an afterthought. Winning makes it seem like your opponent really is a truss-owning, lapel-pin-wearing nitwit. And in defeat, trash talk can be the air bag to break the fall from your hyperbolic heights. The plug-necked yahoos on your team, you can say, will be sacking groceries by the end of the season.

The best trash talk, in my view, is layered and nuanced. And it doesnt focus only on your opponents team. It picks apart your opponent. The idea is to create a shock-and-awe-scale blizzard of nonsense, and the goal is to make your opponent drop his hands from his keyboard in exasperation.

What team does your opponent root for? Accuse a Giants fan of having a Joe Namath pillowcase. Wheres your opponent from? Give a look of concern no matter his reply, then say, I'll try to type slower for you next time. Is your opponent into politics? Label everyone a tax-and-spend corporate shill.

Cap all that with a liberal application of irrelevance. For instance, dont just conclude by saying your opponent is a twerp who drafts like my grandmother. Say that your opponent is a sweater-wearing, eyebrow-plucking twerp who drafts his team about as well as Zsa Zsa Gabor gave acceptance speeches at the Oscars. By the time your foe makes sense of that, his starting running back will have had puppies.

But what about you? Hmm? Recall a memorable slam? Have a tried-and-true technique? Know someone who seems impervious to insult? Take a moment and tells us about it. Put together some (fit-for-publication) thoughts. You wont be too busy returning phone messages from your friends, Im sure, to reply.

In addition to the trash talking, the Sports Alarm has a huge gallery of high resolution pictures of beautiful women and models in bikinis. The most popular models are: Lindsay Lohan, Carrie Underwood, Alessandra Ambrosio, and Paris Hilton.