Puck Ugly

Insults flew like fists in the NHL last week as Penguin Matthew Barnaby and Devil Lyle Odelein engaged in verbal sparring worthy of the WWF, if not Firing Line. Barnaby set the tone on Friday, the day after Game I of the Pittsburgh -New Jersey first-round playoff series, taunting Odelein by calling him Cornelius, a reference to Roddy McDowall's character in Planet of the Apes. Odelein parried by telling the New York Post that Barnaby 's wife is "gawdawful to look at." Barnaby fired back, "Guys on my team think she's kind of cute." Then he added, "My wife's Italian. You might not want to be messing with the wrong people." He also promised to continue the debate on Odelein's supposed simian similarities. "That's going to keep coming," Barnaby said after Game 2. "He has to know that he really looks like an ape."