HOCKEY LAST NIGHT: BIG HIT IN MOTOWN, SENS BURNED DOWN IN HOTLANTA

The first thought upon seeing the collision between the Oilers' Raffi Torres (pictured, in a game last year) and the Red Wings' Jason Williams was to wonder how it would affect Torres.

You could see Williams was hurt (he was taken to hospital, and is apparently going to be OK). It was the look on Torres' face in TV closeups that made you wonder. Here's a guy who can't stay in the league without playing a rough, grinding style, and he had just hurt someone with a hard, clean check (it was a little high, maybe).

Williams, who also had Edmonton's Jason Smith also bearing down on him, didn't seem braced for Torres' check and he was knocked off his feet, spinning around and landing face-first on the ice.

Battle of Alberta said it seems like Torres "can't stomach hurting an opponent. I don't begrudge him that fact."

Exactly. You can't blame Torres for looking very human at that moment, when Williams was down on the ice, and would eventually have to be immobilized and placed on a stretcher. It's pretty beastly when you realize that the increased size and speed of NHLers, not to mention bulky padding they wear and the shorter shifts they play nowadays, are probably outdistancing the human body's ability to withstand a collision. Fans love the big hits and it wouldn't be hockey without them, but after a while you understand every check has two victims, not to be too emo about it.

Bottom line, it seems every few nights in the NHL you see a collision that suggests the game is getting dangerous, and something needs to be done about the equipment (padded wetsuits, anyone?) or the way the game is played.

Thrashers 5 Sens 4: Just remember who was first to joke that "Martin Gerber is Swiss-German for Patrick Lalime."

Bill Clinton was in Ottawa last night to make a speech, so Sens fans, "I feel your pain." Wade Redden returned, Daniel Alfredsson scored for the third straight game, and still Ottawa lost. When a team blows a two-goal lead, a three-goal lead and a pair of two-goal leads three games in a row, it sure looks like they're playing to get someone fired.

Anyway, it's not so much that Gerber isn't working out. It's more that the Sens are paying for the folly John Muckler committed last year at the trade deadline, when he engaged in this doomed courtship of Roberto Luongo when Dwayne Roloson, "the slightly dented model," was readily available. I had just arrived in Ottawa a couple weeks before the deadline, fresh from working in Roloson's hometown of Simcoe, and told anyone I could that Roloson was expecting a trade -- he's told the Twin Cities papers as much -- and that he was ready for playoff pressure.

Instead, Roli went to Edmonton -- maybe Muckler didn't want to step on his old team's toes -- and re-signed quickly after the season. Perhaps he would have done the same with Ottawa.

Red Wings 3 Oilers 0: Edmonton's forwards might have a tough time remembering who was in goal for Detroit... they didn't make Dominik Hasek's acquaintance much as they got outshot 45-16.

By the way, Detroit is 10-4-1 with the NHL's third-worst power play and seventh-worst penalty killing. Picture Mike Babcock, à la Ron Burgundy: "I'm not even mad. I'm actually impressed."

Lightning 4 Pens 3 (overtime): Vinny Lecavalier potted the OT winner after getting a breakaway pass from Martin St-Louis. Nils Ekman's natural hat trick was the fastest hat trick by a Pittsburgh player since Lowell MacDonald in 1973, but you knew that already. MacDonald stills holds the record for fastest three goals by a guy named Lowell, however.

Rangers 4 Panthers 3 (shootout): The Rangers are now 3-for-3 in shootouts. Bet they wish the league had adopted the three-point victory.

FOUR NATIONS CUP

Pretty straightforward here -- Canada beat our second-fave team, Sweden, 7-0, and the Americans handled the Finns, 5-2. Krissy Wendell scored twice for the U.S. Apparently she and her boyfriend, the Leafs' John Pohl, are an uber-competitive jock couple, so maybe he'll do something against the Boston Bruins tonight.

Back with more later. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.