Habs/Isles Preview (I): 80s Retro edition

Remember the early 80s? I was either too young or too hoped up on dope to remember, I can't recall which for some reason. Do you care? Probably not. You know who should? The New York Islanders.

Why? Because except for the huge upset of the Penguins back in 1993 (thanks, BTW), a once proud franchise has sunk into the abyss since the Eights. Four Stanlney Cups during the Reign of Bossy/Potvin/Trottier/Torrey and Arbour means that only 5 other teams have won more Cups. Since then, the Isles have been less successful than New Coke. Talk about mismanagement: Firing Arbour in '85-86 only to bring him back a few years later; buying out the franchise leader, Bryan Trottier; trading Pat LaFontaine; trading Turgeon and Malakhov for Muller and Schneider (thank you, Don Maloney); the John Spano debacle; and the Rangers winning it all in 1994. And we haven't even hit the Charles Wang era yet. All I have to say about that are "Alexei Yashin" and "Mike Milbury". They have been a laughing stock ever since Wang took over - the man has given us this gravest of crimes against hockey fashion and wanted to use a sumo wrestler as a goalie (don't get me started on how stupid and ridiculous that is). Oh, and he gave a 15-year contract to a man with hips that originally belonged to George Burns.

But now they've got John Tavares (born 7 years after their last Cup victory) so they've got that going for them. Not enough to bust the ghosts of 2-and-a-half decades of failure (like what I did there, tying it back into the pic? You're welcome). Now on to the preview:

Hotter than Madonna in a wedding dress at the MTV video awards: Speaking of tits...Andrei Kostitsyn is the only recipient of the first star as voted by Bell subscribers. Exciting. You can also throw TFS(tm), PK Subban and Tutlepleks in there with him. Maybe they'll get to sign pucks in the hallway outside the Habs dressing room one day. Live the dream, boys.

Hotter than Kelly LeBrock in a crop-top: For the Isles, Dwayne Roloson's numbers are almost as good as Carey's the last couple of games. Tavares is tearing it up with 6 points since his brain injury, and someone named PA Parenteau is royally fucking up my hockey pool with 6 points in his last 4 games.

Colder than an ice-cold Cola-cola Classic: Benoit Brunet started the argument for breaking up Gio and Gomez last game, and who are we to argue with such a wise and experienced hockey mind? No, but seriously, he's an idiot, but might have a point about this one. It does seem like Gomez only has eyes for Gio out there, no matter what glorified 4th liner is playing filler along side. How about Gio and Eller together, Jacques? They could be the new Luigi and Mario. Not coincidentally, Montreal's PP is last in the league.

Colder than Cyndi Lauper's album sales after True Colors: For the Isles, Doug Weight has fallen back to earth after a torrid start which the bastard used to seduce me into dropping Alex Tanguay ... not that I'm bitter. And did I mention the Isles have sucked for most of my adult life?

More hurt than Eddie Johnson's feeling when Mario refused to shake his hand or don a Penguin's jersey after getting drafted: Markov's back soon! Other than that the Habs are eerily healthy. Until I wrote that, when the failure of an O-ring on the right solid-fuel rocket booster of TFS's new car caused a huge disaster involving Subban, Big Tits, Turtlepleks, Squid, Gill and Georges.

In worse shape than the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man after they crossed streams: On top of crappy management, the Isles are dealing with crappy luck. The Original Swiss Mister is out most of the year, and hot shot power forward Kyle Okposo is out long term as well. John Bailey is out day-to-day with a creaky hip. Yes, just like your grandmother complains about.

Blogs didn't exist in 1983: so go read The Hockey News, for old times sake. Yes, before THN had a website, a mobile app and glossy magazine layout, it was an actual weekly newspaper. (Stacked in my closet for years waiting to start a fire until my parents finally kicked me out of the basement. If they only knew what I was hiding between issues...)

Speaking of Stay Puft: