LW's NHL Road Trip 2011 (Part Three)

Here is Part Three.  Here was Part Two.

Game #3: San Jose Sharks 2-5 New York Rangers

• Right off the opening faceoff, Brandon Prust and Ryane Clowe "tangle".  Approximately 10 minutes of pirouetting and helmet punching ends with the pair almost landing on top of Pierre McGuire in his usual spot licking Mike Richards' shoes between the benches. 
• News of Sean Avery's impending recall and the Rangers not actually losing at the time make the (mostly failed) attempts to start the "We want Avery" chant more confusing than ever.
• Ryan McDonagh: 1-0.  Scott Gomezhahahahahahahahahahahaha.
• Brandon Dubinsky and Derek Stepan somehow exploit Colin White's legendary footspeed to make it 2-0 in the first; the Rangers looking strangely competent.
• However, it's tied midway through the second period, the tying goal by Logan Couture coming at the end of a shift of six or seven minutes of the crack Jeff Woywitka-Steve Eminger pairing being trapped in their own end by the Sharks' top line.
• Not tied for long as, befitting of a player who looks like Joe Sakic for one game every two months (Joe Sakic's wife for the rest), Erik Christensen makes two great passes on goals by Ryan Callahan and Artem Anisimov.
• In the final minute of the second period, Callahan makes a spectacular stretch/dive from behind the net to poke home a rebound and give the Rangers the unassailable three-goal lead that has not been assailed by a Rangers opponent in, oh...two days.
• The third period is largely a non-event.  Shame.
• In front of me tonight:
  
  • Firstly, your typical MSG BlackBerry Man.  Not even a glance towards the ice during the entire first period.  Doesn't return to his seat for the third.
  • Replaced in the third by a fan in a Patrick Marleau jersey wearing an "Occupy Madison Square Garden" sign around his neck.  Loses marks for not sitting with a friend in a Jeremy Roenick costume holding a bag of guts.
• After the game, Joe Thornton bizarrely (given he was fairly anonymous in defeat) decides to call the Rangers the softest team the Sharks played on their road trip.  With the two teams not meeting again this season (neither team has a chance of winning the Western Conference Final series), this appears to be Jumbo Joe's Halloween equivalent of knocking on the Rangers' dressing room door and running away.

Next up: Logistics and apathy permitting, a two games in one day odyssey spanning a morning (!) AHL clash in Bridgeport, CT - now not featuring the star Avery attraction - and an evening (zzz) dull-fest in tropical Newark, NJ.