In one of their best wins of the season, the Coyotes demolished the Flames 6-0 last night at the Jobing.Com Arena. Which, by the way, is the worst named Arena in the world, that I know about.

After a tight checking and scoreless first period, the Coyotes got a couple lucky bounces to go up 2-0 in the second and then never looked back.

With Mike Smith sitting this one out, Thomas Greiss picked up the shutout. He was especially good in the first with the score tied at zero and the game looking to be the typical Coyotes-style low scoring game. With the game tied, Greiss made several difficult saves and kept the Coyotes alive in what wasn't a great start to the game.

Also strong for Phoenix on this night was captain Shane Doan who scored and added an assist for his first points since returning from his illness. While his goal was more flukey than anything, (it bounced off his shoulder) they all count and its always good to see the Captain pick up a goal.

Along with Doan's two points, Boedker, Stone, Vrbata, Hanzal and Ribeiro also had two each and Korpikoski had three. Yandle played the most with 25 minutes, but somehow managed to be held off the score sheet, despite the six goals.

While Greiss was great, don't look for there to be a goalie controversy, as even though Smith hasn't been the best this year, his stats are still decent and he is on a long term and expensive contract. Also, while people are finicky about goalies, he has a history of success and I wouldn't bet against him picking it up in the second half as he is and has been, after all, one of the best goalies in the league for the last several years.


Finally, Oliver Ekman-Larsson missed his second straight game with the ubiquitous and ridiculous "upper body" injury. Though he did skate yesterday and is thought to maybe be capable of playing Thursday against Minnesota and is probable for Saturday's game against the Ducks.

Sorry for the shortness of this post - other work related things are diverting my attention from hockey today.

Thanks for reading.

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