Last year, announcers had a difficult time knowing exactly what had happened when Patrick Kane scored the Stanley Cup winning goal in Game 6 of the 2010 Stanley Cup Finals. Last night, Kevin Bieska scored a similar goal to propel the Canucks to their first Stanley Cup Finals appearance since 1994. Edler sent the puck off the stanchion, the puck then ricocheted back to Bieksa who shot it past Antti Niemi for the game-winner. The problem, once the puck went off the stanchion, no one knew where it had gone until it bounced out of the net. This set up for some interesting calls from the boys in the booths. I have been able to find two TV calls (Versus and CBC) and two radio calls (Sharks radio and Canucks radio) of the goal. Everyone fell flat on their face last year with Kane. Let's see how we fared this year, shall we!
First up, "The Voice" Dave Strader, Brian Engblom, and Darren Pang on Versus.
Oof. Not only was The Voice caught completely off guard, but all three seemed certain the puck had gone off the netting until they saw the definitive replay that said it hit the stanchion.
Next up, three people who were in Philadelphia for the Kane goal, Jim Hughson, Craig Simpson, and Glenn Healy on CBC.
Oy ve. "Up in the air....Score!". Way to describe the action, Jim. Craig Simpson claimed he thought it went off the netting before Hughson went into his dramatic "Canucks are going to the Stanley Cup Finals call" 15 seconds after the puck crossed the line. Congrats guys, you are 0 for 2.
Here is a very surprised Dan Rusanowsky calling the goal for Sharks radio.
No YouTube video exists, so click here for the audio.
Not bad for a losing announcer, although he clearly lost it as well. Not a bad call though afterwards, and not once did he mention that it may have gone off the netting. He did not correctly identify stanchion, but he did identify off the glass, which is better than netting. Plus one for him.
And lastly, here is Canucks announcer John Shorthouse
No YouTube video exists, so click here for the audio.
Winner, winner, chicken dinner! After all these attempts this year and last year, we finally got someone to give a good dramatic call that did not sound lost, confused, surprised, or mentioned things that did not actually happen.
So congrats, Canucks fans. I take it you will be replaying the call from John Shorthouse for many years to come.
I'd give Hughson more credit. He gave Bieksa the goal afterwards instead of assuming it went out of play like Strader did.
ReplyDeleteI'd rather be silent than just blurt out what Strader and co. did.
Imagine Bob Cole on that one..... ;)
Hughson did do a better job than Strader, I will give him that.
ReplyDelete23 hours later, Bob Cole still would not have figured out what happened.