Game Report Day 28 - CBJ 2 @ ATL 3

(Columbus, Ohio)

     The Blue Jackets were involved in a tight contest last night, getting edged by Richard Poelkers Atlanta Thrashers. Believe it or not they were beaten in the faceoff circle for the first time in recent memory (one of the few strengths of this team).
     Halfway through the first period the Thrashers struck first on a absolute laser beam from leading scorer Patrick Marleau, his 11th of the season on a sweet feed from cagey vet Viatcheslav Kozlov. Just about a minute later, the Thrashers scored again on a seeing eye slapper from the point from stud defenceman Duncan Keith. J.F. Jacques had seen enough, he decided he had to spark his team and promptly jumped Aaron Asham, and they proceeded to have a good tilt (in which we will later find out the results to :)).
     Five minutes into the second there was another scrap, Columbus tough guy Jody Shelley responded to the result of the previous fight and challenged Aaron Asham. You sure wouldn't know that these teams don't face off very much with the way this game went. At the mid-point of the second period budding youngster Kyle Okposo tapped home his fourth marker of the year past Atlanta 'keeper Craig Anderson.
     Later on in the period Atlanta defender Steve Montador went out looking for revenge, and proceeded to have a go with the Jackets Jody Shelley. The increased playing time has sure given Shelley a lot of confidence.      
Maybe the momentum shifted to Atlanta because shortly thereafter Atlanta went up by a score of 3-1 on a goal from Brandon Yip.
     To open up the third period, 19 year old Columbus defenceman Zach Bogosian blasted a past Anderson to bring the game back within one goal. That was inevitably as close as Columbus would get as the final score did not change after the Bogosian goal. Near the end of the game, something must have really ticked off Duncan Keith, or Jody Shelley was breaking the "code" by dropping the flippers with Keith. I'm sure you can imagine how this one might have turned out.
     The lone bright spot for the Jackets was yet again netminder Marc-Andre Fleury, who made 39 saves on 42 shots and is having a stellar season despite facing a league leading amount of shots per game.
     Up and down the Columbus lineup expectations are not being met, the top line of Koivu-Backes-Vrbata are absolutely snakebitten. None of these players have more than seven points in twelve games. This is the reason that some of the Jackets players may be on the chopping block. When reached for comment after the game about possible trade rumours Radim Vrbata had this to say:

              "All I can do is play hockey. I have many shots, but not many goals. I try hard to score goals, but everything is going not right for me now. I like to play in Columbus, they have been good to me, you know. Hopefully we can turn things around, then maybe rumour will stop. But probably not, we'll see. I will not worry, just keep shooting always."

    
     Clearly Vrbata is not happy, but has shown no ill-will towards the Columbus organization. We are sure many guys are in the same mindframe. Columbus' GM is no doubt working the phones trying to shake some things up. He can't do much worse than he is now, as his Jackets have a whopping two points in twelve games, and a total of nineteen goals. Surprisingly, their only win of the season was against the powerhouse Blackhawks!

That is all for now.....