31: St. Luke’s Miracle

0:00Justin: Hey, Andrew. Hey, Justin. We actually haven't done that in two episodes. I know. I think the people missed it. I missed it. Me too. Hey, we're tonight we're doing back by popular demand format. Tonight is game seven. So Andrew and I do not know what happens in game seven at this moment.

0:20Andrew: Not yet.

0:21Justin: But we're gonna recap game five, game six, which were miracle games that we got. And now we are miraculously getting game seven. And now we are going to watch that game after. We're going to record a bit and we're going to watch that game and then we're going to come back and we're. You get the unfiltered reaction to whatever happens.

0:40Andrew: Unchecked.

0:41Justin: Unchecked. It went out, it went over very well. We appreciate all the feedback we received.

0:46Andrew: It's our highest performing episode. So we're back again.

0:50Justin: Last week we did it and we won.

0:52Andrew: We're putting out the same vibes.

0:55Justin: Everything we can do to make those happen again.

0:57Andrew: Yes, exactly. Welcome to the AudPod where we're talking Kitchener Rangers hockey with the AudBalls themselves. Andrew and Justin.

1:11Justin: Take it away, fellas. Game seven is happening tonight. Andrew, Game six. You were at game six. We are going to game seven. Man.

1:22Andrew: We started this episode last Wednesday and it was like a waiting execution. It was three of the worst games that the boys had played. They looked flat and how do we not be doom and gloom about a 3 nothing deficit against a really good team? And you know what? I was surprised at how much we actually did draw positive from those three games. And then of course, we really leaned into the comeback kids in the second part of that episode where we came back from game four and down three to one, we just had some sort of weird little spark that we could come back and win it. And here we are, game seven.

2:03Justin: We are game seven. Yeah.

2:06Andrew: At any point, I guess in any of these past three games they could have lost and then the AudPod would be doing a season recap right now.

2:13Justin: Yeah, it. I'm just happy we are in, Tony.

2:14Andrew: I'm just excited. Yes. For more hockey. At least one more game. At least one more opportunity to watch Jackson Parsons and Trent Swick and the boys get out there and play some Rangers hockey.

2:26Justin: Yeah. These games have been very exciting. So obviously last week, Wednesday, we won in a shout out at home. Then on Friday we went to back to Windsor. We won five to two in a pretty dominant game. Oh, yeah. And then Easter Sunday, we came back to the Aud and we won four to nothing. Another Shutout by Jackson Parsons.

2:54Andrew: Another shutout. Two in three games. And realistically, he's only given up one true, like, hockey goal in these three games. Because one of the two goals he gave up in game five in the five to two win was a EA Sports NHL goal. It was a leg glitch goal.

3:14Justin: It was Frank Costanza. One in a million shot, Doc. One in a million shots.

3:19Andrew: It was a. Basically a dump in that. Went off his water bottle behind him, bounced up in the air, bounced off his back and into the net. I've never seen that before. We'll never see that again. I feel very comfortable saying that. I've seen it go off the glass and go off the goalie's back. I've never seen it go off a goalie's water bottle.

3:42Justin: No, I tell you. And the way it fluttered in, too. It was just like you could just. In the replay, you didn't really know what was happening in the moment, but in the replay you're like, oh, are you kidding me?

3:53Andrew: Rotation of the earth played a part. Like, it was ridiculous. So realistically, really, only one goal has got past him in these three games. As one of the themes that we had last week was talking about regression, positive regression. Jackson Parsons positively regressed from being not his best hockey. Still a pretty good goalie. Still some pretty good efforts there. Of course, Kitchener wasn't scoring, so you can't blame a goalie too much. Yeah, but he is overcorrected into being this unbelievably dominant force in these last three games. So it's been a treat to watch. The boys can be proud of what they've done, and I'm proud of what they've done this season. And realistically, if they do, if this is it tonight after game 7, then Jackson Parsons last two starts at the Aud were shutouts in the playoffs.

4:44Justin: What more could you really ask for? This was a rebuilding team and now we've gone to game seven and Brown two. This has been phenomenal.

4:49Andrew: Went down three nothing and looked like the walking dead in those first three games. I'm beyond psyched that we're here, and I'm grateful we're here. That 52 victory was headlined by some more positive regression. Trent Swick, Christian Humphreys and Jack Pridham went ballistic. They combined for eight points. Trent Swick had two goals and an assist. Christian Humphreys had a goal and an assist.

5:13Justin: Beautiful goal by Christian Humphreys Yes, absolutely. We had talked about Christian Humphreys a number of times throughout the playoffs. Here and we're a little worried about him. It felt like maybe the nerves had gotten to him a little bit and maybe there was a little bit. Some of his confidence seemed to be. But I think Trent Swick knocked his confidence back into place in game one. He took a.

5:35Andrew: He took quite the hard, hard reset from Trent Swick's chicken wing, which is one attached to a 6 foot 6, 6 foot 7 body.

5:44Justin: One thing that these guys will never understand, but we will basically he took the N64 cartridge out, blew on it and put it back in the machine.

5:53Andrew: Luca Romano and Luke Ellinas combined for a goal and it was nice to see Ando got on the score sheet with an assist on that empty netter.

6:01Justin: Oh, he got two and he got two assists in that game.

6:03Andrew: You're right, he did. He had two. He had two. So it was great to see Ando get some playoff points for the old career stat line. You love that because he's a great Ranger of all time. I'm sure he'll enter that conversation very soon. Protest did score a goal in this one. But I will say across both games this I will interject in to myself, Liam Greentree was not playing in this game. This was the game he missed with the flu or he was sickness or whatever, a bug or whatever. Which feels a bit like karma for that 122 drubbing where the Rangers were sick. Let me remind you that Liam Greentree scored five goals in game three.

6:43Justin: I'm pretty sure the one thing we said last episode before we had watched game four, that top line, there was nothing wrong with them. Absolutely nothing. Right? Yep.

6:54Andrew: So, yeah. So they contained protests and Moreno, who they only got on the score sheet once in this game. And then of course in the next game they didn't get on the score sheet at all. And Green Tree came back. He didn't look a hundred percent. But that's the playoffs, baby. That's playoff hockey. If you're 100%, then you probably were not playing all year.

7:14Justin: That's pretty much all you get.

7:16Andrew: There's not much to talk about as far as Windsor is concerned in Game 6 because they didn't register.

7:21Justin: We got a lot to talk about with the Rangers.

7:23Andrew: Exactly. Including killing six penalties.

7:27Justin: Yeah. So that was one thing we talked about last week as well, is that the officiating has been a bit lopsided. I would say that it has corrected positively in the fact that it's not that the Rangers are taking less penalties, it's just that the Spitfires are getting more deserved Penalties. Yeah.

7:45Andrew: Penalty kill has gone 14 for 14 in these three, which is what we

7:49Justin: saw against Flint was a dominant penalty.

7:53Andrew: Truly. Truly, yes.

7:54Justin: This game, like this is when we Sam O'Reilly had talked about Mercer and Arquette in the previous game. Yeah. In game three. Did a pretty great game.

8:05Andrew: They did.

8:05Justin: And this game, I think you and I were texting about Mercer moments before he scored the opening and inevitable game winning goal.

8:15Andrew: Absolutely.

8:16Justin: It was an awesome goal.

8:17Andrew: It was. And that line which has come together now that Ellenus and Humphreys are back, we've got Mercer, Vermeulen and are cat and we've got Lamb bumped up to line two. Mercer, Vermeulin and Aret have been the team have been the line faced with shutting down Protas and Green Tree and Moreno. And they've been doing it. Not just doing it, but they're scoring, they're putting on pressure, they're controlling possession. They're literally doing anything, everything you'd need them to do to cancel out these guys. And honestly it feels like maybe the strategy is attack when protests and Moreno and Greentree are on the ice because that's not their forte. Their forte isn't defense. Those guys are unbelievable. But maybe the Spitfires have regressed back to the mean of. They really are a top heavy team with kind of two guys. Three guys. I had a buddy who watches the OHL text me and he said maybe the Spitfires are a bit of a two or three trick pony right now. And that's what it feels like. I think they're a good team. There's lots of good players. They've turned it around in Windsor. But that whole argument with depth versus top heavy play has completely flipped. Completely flipped. Now that the depth scoring is there and the top end boys on the Rangers are going line one is scoring. Pridham had two goals in this game including the coveted penalty shot goal which

9:46Justin: blew the roof off the Aud Yeah, un unbelievable odd. I was watching from home. I could. I could feel it in Cambridge. the Aud just vibrating.

9:57Andrew: Yeah, it was definitely a check the Richter scale because there's some seismic activity because the Aud was going berserk. It was just one of those moments that they were already up one on the Mercer goal, as you had said and that was a beautiful goal. And then Pridham gets sprung on a breakaway and a Spitfire player without his stick grabs him and tears him down on the breakaway.

10:22Justin: What idea was that?

10:23Andrew: Come on dude, I get it to some degree but realistically you're going to draw a penalty shot there and he has Time to think about what he's doing. So it's actually not a good penalty, but I understand that in some cases you think you got to take away the scoring opportunity and go on the penalty kill. That wasn't the case because he was clearing away on a breakaway.

10:44Justin: So he was.

10:45Andrew: So it really was a bad decision because the Aud we saw was this awesome, unforgettable sequence between Pridham and Parsons where they go and they confer and you can tell that Parsons is given the scouting report is saying, this is the thing you don't think of. Parsons is standing there watching Joey Costanzo play. So when the play is down at Joey Castanzo's end, Parsons is just watching him. So now that there's an opportunity, there's really nobody better than Parsons to go and say, what do you think I should do? You know, And. And Parsons clearly gave him good information. And what I loved was Pridham used his speed to his advantage. A lot of times these guys go in and they try and do this reverse. I'm going to go really slow and try and force the goalie to make a move first. Pridham just went in, has that elite speed, went in, cut across the front and deposited in the far, far end of the net. And it was just. It was. No doubt, it was the turning point of that game. It felt like that was the moment that Windsor was like, oh, no. And it was only two nothing. But it did feel. It was halfway through the game and you could feel the Aud Not getting ahead of themselves. But it was this outburst of, we're going to win this game, we're going to win this game.

12:03Justin: And then he did his classic flowcheck, Selly, and then skated immediately back to Parsons and gave him the biggest hug. We talked about this too. Is like these guys are obviously there's more than just like they're playing well as a team on the ice. Like, they are obviously gelling as a team in all facets. And you can just see it in those types of moments where they're just so excited for each other and they're just so excited to be here.

12:26Andrew: Totally agreed. They're a great squad and I really hope that we get to watch more of them because the story feels unfinished.

12:34Justin: It does, yeah. And then Pridham got another beautiful goal about one one full period later. Yeah, Almost to the second. And then Vermelen just finished it off in the third. It was interesting because I think they had pulled goalie yet. And then they put the goal. They put Costanzo back In. Yeah.

12:52Andrew: When they drew a penalty.

12:53Justin: They drew a penalty.

12:54Andrew: Yeah. So they pulled Costanzo with five minutes left.

12:57Justin: And when you're down three goals, what are you going to do?

13:00Andrew: Makes sense. But Pridham actually had a chance to score and just missed the net narrow.

13:04Justin: I don't know about Pridham in these empty nets.

13:06Andrew: It was almost an 80 foot shot. So we'll give him a break.

13:09Justin: We'll give them a pass. Yeah, yeah. For sure.

13:12Andrew: Yeah.

13:12Justin: That. This game six. This was. I didn't really sleep that night after this game. I was just wired. Oh, it was unbelievable. The energy coming off even at home was amazing. It felt like such a great game.

13:24Andrew: Yeah, it was great. I was talking to people down there. People were talking to me. It was like people in the crowd were just giving each other high fives and on the walk out it felt, you know what, they're doing this. And there was chanting, let's go Rangers. All through the concourse. As we exited the building, as we mentioned on our social media, I Sam O'Reilly Andalorian sign which is just the coolest thing ever. It's been embraced by the Rangers social media. It's been embraced by the Andalorian himself and now it's showing up at games with the fans who are listening to us. We absolutely love that. That's just the coolest thing ever.

14:00Justin: Yeah, it's. It's like super validating for us but also it's like fun to be a part of this community. It goes back to the being embraced by the community and being a part of it. It's just. It feels awesome. Do you remember the person's name?

14:12Andrew: Jen McKinnon messaged me and said that's me and my friend's sign. So Jen, thank you so much for reaching out. Thank you so much for making a cool sign and we hope you. We see you in round three. Yeah.

14:25Justin: All right. So we are running up close to gametime star. But there was one other bit of business that we want to talk about because two former Rangers had an exciting week in the NHL right before the NHL playoffs started. We're now a few days into NHL playoffs, but there was a game, there was a couple of games before the playoffs started when basically everybody was locked up. And so a bunch of rookies got an opportunity to play. One of which of course is our dear friend of a friend of the pod, Hunter Brustevich, is that maybe the

14:57Andrew: long term goal is to make Hunter Brustevich a friend of the Pod and not just a friend of a friend of the Pod.

15:05Justin: The friend is my jersey. My. My jersey knows Hunter Verustavich personally now, but not me. We'll get the connections going. We'll see if we can maybe get Hunter on to say hello at some point.

15:16Andrew: We'll lobby for you.

15:16Justin: Yeah, please. I did seem to indicate that he had died, even though he hasn't, obviously because he played his first NHL game.

15:24Andrew: I'm almost going to argue from a skeptic point that I'm not sure of the whereabouts of Andre Bruce Davich because I didn't watch the game, because I don't watch Calgary Flames games. So he almost has to come on here to prove to me.

15:37Justin: To prove it to you.

15:38Andrew: He's very much alive.

15:40Justin: He had a good game. Calgary had a good game that neither played. LA was of course benching some of their superstars, as was the Flames for very different reasons.

15:49Andrew: Yeah, but.

15:50Justin: Yeah, so there was a good number. I think there were six rookies playing for the Flames. One of which was Hunter versus David, of course. One of which was Zane park, who of course got all the headlines because he scored a goal in the game. Brucevich had a terrific game. I was watching. He played 18, 23, played 20 shifts. He was a plus two. He had a. He had a penalty. He got two shots on net hit. He had a takeaway. Like he looked like a good defenseman. He looked like he fit in with the team. Calgary's identity has always been strong, puck moving defenseman. He very much fits into the style and the play of the Calgary Flames. I'm excited. I imagine that there's a very real possibility that he will be getting some NHL time next season and he didn't look at a place at all. So I'm excited for it.

16:35Andrew: I love that for him, even if it is in Calgary. But I'm excited for former Rangers across the league. Like, we know that there's guys leaving this team that already have NHL deals and we'll always be rooting for Rangers right across.

16:48Justin: We will.

16:49Andrew: Vili Ottavinen had a NHL debut with the Seattle Kraken and he scored an assist. He played with the Kitchener Rangers in 2019, 2020. He played 53 games and had 15 points. He is a big 6 foot 5 defenseman. He's only 22 years old, so there's lots of opportunity there. And I think it's probably pretty good that he got on the score sheet now. Yeah, someone else had an NHL debut, but not as a player. Former Kitchener Rangers captain Liam Moscont will make his NHL debut as a referee in Buffalo at the second last game of the season, April 17th. He actually scored the teddy bear goal once upon a time. It's pretty cool that he put on the black and white stripes with the little orange trim. And he's a referee. And I'll try to remember that when I disagree with one of his calls that he too is a Ranger. So you gotta give him a little bit of love. So he joins Dan Kelly. Dan Kelly, also referee was one of the. One of the. One of the short list groats that we didn't have room for. So just a little nugget there. There's. There's another Ranger as an.

18:04Justin: There's a little bit of history of some refs coming out of the Rangers.

18:06Andrew: Yeah.

18:07Justin: Pretty cool. I feel like it's a great way to continue a career in hockey. Like after you're playing. Yeah.

18:12Andrew: I think you have to be incredibly

18:14Justin: gifted as a skater. Oh, for sure. The reps. We've done a lot of ref bashing over the last couple weeks, but yeah, refs work incredibly hard in these games. Yeah.

18:25Andrew: I couldn't imagine the cardio and the leg strength and the skating ability you need to have as a ref.

18:30Justin: No padding and they take a lot of pucks.

18:32Andrew: Oh, and not only that, we saw one in Bridgeport in the AHL get checked because the player. And it was an accident. The player actually was looking over his shoulder and then the ref happened to be out of position and they never get of position like this. So it's a dangerous. It's dangerous because he was out of position and the player turned around and gave him a shove, not realizing, like, as his head's turning, he's already shoving the body because he can feel a body right in front of him. And sent this poor Raph into the boards. Got a 10 game suspension for it, but was down, like in his ear, like, are you okay? I'm so sorry. So being an official is dangerous. It's difficult. And we understand. That said get it right. Just kidding. That said favor my team. All right. No, do better. No, I don't want them to favor my team. I want it to be fair and balanced and transparent.

19:23Justin: Yeah, you really just want some transparency.

19:24Andrew: And realistically, it's. There was a lot of discussion on the TikTok about the refuse suck clip that we put up and where we were talking about the discrepancy in officiating. We weren't denying the Rangers penalties. We weren't denying that the Rangers were playing undisciplined. We weren't denying that at all. In fact, that was one of our frustrations. The frustration lied with the fact that the Spitfires were just not getting penalties. It just wasn't being called against the Aud now it's flipped and the Rangers are still being somewhat undisciplined. However, the Rangers are. The penalty kill is clicking. So if the Rangers are disciplined and they keep playing like they've been playing, they got a real shot at going through.

20:07Justin: I was going to ask you what your keys to the game were heading into game seven, but that's it. That's it.

20:12Andrew: It's discipline. And Jackson Parsons has to be the best player on the Rangers because he is the best player on the Rangers.

20:19Justin: He is the best player on the Rangers for sure.

20:21Andrew: What are your keys to the game?

20:23Justin: I was also going to go discipline, but let's go with. I think we found a strength in the last game with Mercer and co shutting down that top line like we talked about. And I think it will be. It's always harder because when you're away, you don't get the lineup matchups that you want. But I think the Juice and his coaching staff are very good at figuring these things out. And I think that is what we. The strength is being able to shut down the top line of Windsor because that's all you have to do. If you can shut down the top line of Windsor, you're free to go.

20:55Andrew: That's a good way of putting it. And we're also free to go, Justin, now because. Yeah, we're almost game time.

21:02Justin: We'll be back shortly. We. We reverse.

21:14Andrew: The story is not over. Oh, my goodness. I'm so excited for everyone who was listening to the first part of this episode because they know. Because they know.

21:27Justin: Andrew, you LeBron us into.

21:30Andrew: Oh, yeah, here it is.

21:31Justin: Thank you.

21:32Andrew: Yeah. Here I've got the wired headphones.

21:34Justin: Don't let us. Don't let us get.

21:39Andrew: Oh, man.

21:40Justin: That was one of the most stressful games of my life.

21:44Andrew: That was one of the most stressful games of my life, for sure. That was one of the best games, I think as well. It was one of the best series I've ever seen. It was the tale of two, three game splits, basically. And the Aud was the technical slobber knocker of Game 7 because it was literally like two heavyweights who beat the you know what out of each other for six games. And the Aud was the championship round. And it got defensive, it got tight, it got technical.

22:17Justin: Yeah.

22:18Andrew: Oh, man.

22:18Justin: It was goalies, first, defense, then the refs just stayed out of it. They were like, we're not in. We're here.

22:28Andrew: The officials and I don't understand.

22:30Justin: I don't understand.

22:32Andrew: I don't understand how everyone basically just has this gentleman's agreement in game seven that no one's gonna do anything too outrageous.

22:41Justin: Yeah.

22:42Andrew: And no one's gonna get called for anything. And we're all just gonna play some good hockey. Can we just play all of the games? Like so much better than watching just teams trading power plays.

22:53Justin: It's so much better. Yes. I understand why the NHL puts the whistles away in the playoffs. It's just so crazy that we're back and forth. But I do not want to talk about reffing because this game. Holy cow. Yeah. Just. I don't even know what to say. Like, Elena's got a beauty, like in the second period or at the middle of the first.

23:17Andrew: Yeah.

23:18Justin: And then he got about 39 chances in the game.

23:23Andrew: Listen, if Luke Ellen is. Hadn't have scored the winner and Windsor won this game, Luke Ellinas would be like this for about, I don't know, three, four, five nights at least in a row. Just literally thinking about all those chances he had. It was only fitting, man. It was only fitting that he got it. He's the guy we LeBron James memed in the post after game four.

23:51Justin: So we manifested this.

23:53Andrew: We really did.

23:54Justin: Yeah.

23:55Andrew: It maybe we had absolutely nothing to do with. No, but it. In a way it felt like it because all these random things that we said and we're just, you know, two. Just two dudes in a room talking. But almost all of them came true. Don't worry, AudPod audience. We are not going to let it go to our heads. We are still going to admit that we know next to nothing and we're learning everything all the time. And we're having a blast learning about the OHL this year because this has to be one of the most fun seasons and runs that to be your first season to follow a team.

24:31Justin: What else?

24:31Andrew: What else could you ask for here? There's one thing you could ask for,

24:34Justin: but we're not going to get greedy. We're not going to.

24:36Andrew: We're not going to get greedy.

24:38Justin: Just back to Luke Elena's. He got eight shots and four of them were high danger shots according to the ohl. Three of those were breakaways.

24:49Andrew: Yeah. Three of those were breakaways. And one of those, he beat Costanzo cleanly.

24:56Justin: Just cleanly post. Yeah. Lamb has been a stud through this series. He took my shot. It Was like, because of what overtime in these game sevens become, Right? You go to game seven, you go to an overtime.

25:09Andrew: Oh, yeah.

25:09Justin: Like, everybody has everything to lose, and it's just. You're not playing to win. You're playing to capitalize on the other team's first mistake.

25:19Andrew: That is a very poignant way of saying that, because that is exactly what, like, once it gets late, especially late into overtime, especially in a Game 7 when everybody's tired, like, you could just see, like, the legs were not there. But I will say Tanner Lam had probably the most legs out of anybody. I could see in his lateral movement. Quick. He was making good turns and stuff. And I. I could feel something coming with that line. Just. I could feel like Tanner Lam was in the right place. Obviously, Ellenus was all over the place tonight.

25:52Justin: Yeah.

25:52Andrew: We've been talking about. We've been talking about Lou Ganis the whole season. We've been saying he could be the guy if he. And you know what? He's had to be the guy. And he is. He is him.

26:04Justin: He is the guy.

26:04Andrew: As after his hat trick, he turned and looked skyward and said, I'm him. I'm using that. The only time because Luke himself said it. It was a crazy game. There was a couple of moments where Jackson Parsons bailed the Aud There was one especially where there was a turnover behind the net and protest who. I was like, can't be him. This guy can't be him.

26:29Justin: Anybody but him.

26:30Andrew: And he sent it out front. And forgive me, I can't remember who it was, but it was somebody dangerous like. Like Davis or Abraham or Mornell. And they put it on net and it was just like it was stopped. And that was the end of the scare. But the scare was bad. But the scare was the scare ended with Jackson Parsons.

26:49Justin: And there were a few saves tonight

26:51Andrew: that he made look routine.

26:53Justin: Yeah.

26:54Andrew: And they were anything.

26:55Justin: Stellar shot he does.

26:57Andrew: Something I've noticed is he really places his glove out there and, like, really puts it out there.

27:03Justin: Yeah.

27:04Andrew: And I find that it's almost like they shoot into his glove. It's almost like he has it perfectly placed that a lot of times you don't see him move his glove at all. His positioning is just so solid.

27:14Justin: Yeah. And what a redemption for Jackson Parsons. That was last week's episode. He looked fine. Like, he never looked bad in the series. He just looked mortal at the beginning of this series. And then there were.

27:26Andrew: Yeah, there was just a couple goals that went in that, like, he hadn't been letting in Those kind of goals all year that like we weren't criticizing him. We never criticized the original AudPod guy, but.

27:35Justin: But three goals against in four games. And those four games were games four through seven of a second round playoff series.

27:43Andrew: If you only let in three goals over four games, you're winning the series. And we did. They won series and we're still got a show. So. Yes. What a life.

27:57Justin: Okay, I want to do quick off your head. I want to do three stars from this game. Three stars that were not one of the actual three stars of this game. So the real three stars of the game were Luke Ellinas He got two goals, you got the first. Jetson Parsons saved 39 of 40. And then of course, Joey Costanzo saved 30 of 32. These are the three stars I expected to see in this game. Who's your first star that isn't one of those guys?

28:23Andrew: Oh, I don't know if I'd give him first start. Why don't you go first and I'll get your first star.

28:27Justin: My first star is Jakub Chromiak He played a lot of shifts in this game and when it came to overtime specifically, he was the unsung hero. We've talked about unsung heroes. He was the pure unsung hero of this game. Every time Protas was near the puck, Chromiak was there tying up a stick, pushing him into the corner. Every time Green Tree or whoever was near the puck, Chromiak was blocking shots. He was always disruptive enough that they could never get their shtick going. As soon as we hit overtime, I got a little worried. Overtime is not about depth. You want the pure goal scorer on your team, you want the best goal scorer. And arguably Windsor had two better goal scorers than we have on the Rangers going into overtime. So that's what I was worried. And I think Chromiak shut that down. Everything that stopped that from happening, I put almost all into Chromiak. I saw his assignment and he was quietly stealthy doing it.

29:33Andrew: Okay, I will give my first star to the rookie Cameron Arquette who was literally all over the ice all night, never stopped moving his feet, broke up passes, dug in the corners, was he's a rookie. He's in there against guys much bigger than him and he was winning draws. He was out muscling guys like AJ Spellisi, who looked like a man possessed at times.

30:01Justin: Totally.

30:02Andrew: Because I was like, who's this guy? This guy looks like he wants to win this so bad. And Cameron Arquette played out of his mind, he played. He was often the last guy left out on that line. When Mercer and Vermeulen would change, Arquette was the deep man still playing. And so there was times where he was out there with other line mates and he didn't have a chance to change. And he was still out there. He still looked fresh all the time. I'm absolutely blown away with the rookie Arquette. I'm so excited for him next year. Yeah, he looks great.

30:35Justin: It's even hard to believe he's a rookie still, like, yeah, that's the level he plays with. You know what? I don't want to try and think of two more. Let's stick with stars. How do you feel about that? Yeah, okay, you guess.

30:45Andrew: Was the guy that I was in and on about making him the first star. I'm going to give him an honorable mention here. Or just another star. I have no idea what it is. Carson Campbell played out of his mind. Carson Campbell played one of the best games Carson Campbell has ever played. Carson Campbell is. He's Chromiak's right hand. He's basically the guy who spelled Chromiak. So when Chromiak needed a spell and to come off and rest, Carson Campbell was out there playing that right side. The shot block. He hit the post. He was just. He took. He broke up passes. Listen, this is not necessarily a high skill, like, fancy kind of skating guy. This is like a blue collar. In your face, Steady Eddie. All year he's been doing it and I just loved to see it again in Game 7.

31:32Justin: And he never got tired.

31:33Andrew: Carson Campbell at Campbellford does not get tired.

31:37Justin: You never get when you eat your Campbell soup in Campbellford. Carson Campbell does not get tired. Him and Hicks, I think, had a crazy hit in the first period where they like destroyed each other. Yes. Like, they were both like. I didn't think either of them were coming back for the rest of the game. That was it. And they both came back and. And he then had this amazing game. But that was like in the first period.

32:04Andrew: Absolutely.

32:05Justin: Okay, fine. You gave a second one. I'm going to give a second one. I mentioned him earlier, Lam. He's been a monster in this series. He was. He obviously was like the assist on the winning goal and he had an unbelievable series. At one point tonight, my wife and I. My wife was watching the game with me and he got in between like, protest and someone else huge on Windsor and he was trying to break the line and he just. He just couldn't get through there. The tenacity to even attempt to do it. Like that's just all Tannerland. That's what he is like he is a go getter machine.

32:42Andrew: And they often in hockey call smaller hard working guys spark plugs. Redefine the term. Tanner Lam is the spark plug of the series.

32:55Justin: The laminator is going to be up there one day with the Lamborghini and all I can name is Flames the Mod, honestly.

33:04Andrew: Yeah, this is the thing is he's a guy who plays much bigger game

33:09Justin: than, than he is.

33:10Andrew: He's not a small human, he's a regular sized human, but he happens to

33:14Justin: play a game with. When you play against Protoss, who is a freak. Yeah, this is a hockey player for ants.

33:22Andrew: This Windsor team was, is just a big team. So honestly the Aud feels like going back to that heavyweight championship analogy, it feels he let the big guy punch himself out, just take over and you beat him up. And then once it gets down to brass tacks, who runs out of gas first is the big dude. So you just hang in there and eventually you get the dub. And that's what they did.

33:45Justin: A special shout out here to Zhu who ended up playing the whole series like it was good.

33:52Andrew: No, I texted you during the overtime. I was like, we're not seeing you and McNeil?

33:57Justin: No.

33:57Andrew: I wondered how long into overtime it would take to start seeing that third pairing.

34:03Justin: Yeah, the fourth line.

34:04Andrew: That's what happens in overtime though. They did their job. He took some hits, he dished out some hits. I love watching the kid play hockey. I think he's exactly the type, type of young, raw, big, physical, strong, heavy shot defenseman that you can mold with this kind of a coaching staff. They're going to mold him into such a great.

34:22Justin: He's going to be a terrific player.

34:24Andrew: He already is a good player. So he's going to be, he's going to be a great player.

34:27Justin: You were listening, did you listen to Farwell through the whole game?

34:31Andrew: I listened to Farwell. I didn't hear Farwell's overtime call because my Bluetooth headphones died.

34:38Justin: You were listening to Mike Farwell on the radio, watching the stream of the game and I was, I was watching the stream of the game, but I was listening to the Windsor commentators and at one point, I think it was in the third period, the commentator was like, they keep hitting you and he just doesn't move.

34:58Andrew: Yeah, he's a big tough kid, man. The bottom line is like he's in the lineup and guys are scratched because he's played himself into the lineup and they can't take him out because he's just playing too well.

35:12Justin: Yeah.

35:13Andrew: So what else can you say to put him into the lineup? And they won the series, so I'm not saying he won them the series. I'm just saying that. But once you start winning games with that lineup, you don't go away, you don't change.

35:25Justin: We did this again to ourselves or we have no plan. So I'm just going to end it here. First of all, I want to Sam O'Reilly huge shout out to Jeff Pickle over at CTV Kitchener. I'm so sorry that you thought that we were experts enough to call us to talk about this game 7, but appreciate it nonetheless. That was super fun. It was another good part of today.

35:44Andrew: That was. Yes, there's been a lot of good today, both personally and with the Rangers. So I'm very grateful for Jeff Pickle reaching out to us.

35:53Justin: Of course, you have to thank Ken Born the director of branding and marketing. I think we're both wearing our AudPod hats today.

35:59Andrew: Proud on the Kitchener news, we did

36:01Justin: indeed shout out to the prodigal producer,

36:04Andrew: Liam the Phenom, the third round of the playoffs. Phenom.

36:09Justin: And Andrew, you can find us on the social medias at.

36:12Andrew: At the AudPod on Tick Tock and Instagram. Check it out. You can see that little piece that Mr. Pickle did for us now. You can also check us out on YouTube and you can watch the extended version. If you're listening right now, you can watch the extended version uncut, where it's unedited, it's raw.

36:31Justin: And you might have noticed we didn't talk about the next series at all. Obviously, we're going to London. Starts on Friday. We did not want to mess with anything in the universe by even looking up anything about London.

36:45Andrew: You know what?

36:45Justin: The game starts Friday. This podcast comes out on Friday. You'll know what happens. We complain about London all the time. So, yeah, as always, let's go ahead.

36:54Andrew: Slay the dragon.

36:56Justin: Yeah, exactly. Winning streaks don't go forever, Andrew. You can find us at the Kitchener

37:04Andrew: Memorial Auditorium, See at the Aud