Up until now, our look at ten memorable goals in the history
of the Washington Capitals franchise has been limited to memories in the
regular season. With the fourth most
memorable goal, we enter the history of the postseason and a player considered
by most to be among hockey’s royalty.
4. April 28, 2009 –
Sergei Fedorov: “One More for the Road”
When Washington Capitals General Manager George McPhee woke
on the morning of February 26, 2008, his Capitals were fighting for their
playoff lives. It was an unexpected
development, given that the Caps started the season going 3-13-1 to finish
October after starting the schedule with a three-game winning streak, firing
their coach on Thanksgiving, and finding themselves in last place in the
Eastern Conference on December 28th.
But on February 26th – trading deadline day – McPhee’s
Capitals were 14-8-3 since finding themselves in last place in the East and had
closed to within five points of both the Southeast Division leading Carolina Hurricanes
and the eighth place in the conference Philadelphia Flyers. Instead of sellers at the trading deadline,
looking to next season, the Caps were looking to add pieces to validate the
hope that the push in the 2009 portion of the season sparked.
And so it was that McPhee, looking to add experience to a
squad brimming in talent but yet quite green, pulled the trigger on a trade
that sent defenseman prospect Theo Ruth to the Columbus Blue Jackets for
17-year veteran Sergei Fedorov. Having
appeared in almost 1,200 regular season games and another 162 in the postseason
– almost as many as the combined total of the Washington roster of skaters
(169) -- Fedorov was the embodiment of experience. More to the point, of those 169 games of postseason
experience on the Caps’ roster, 60 games of that experience was on the bench,
injured (Michael Nylander and Brian Pothier). They needed veteran contributions.
Fedorov provided both a spark (2-11-13 in 18 games) and a
steadying influence on the “Young Guns” -- Alex Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom,
Alexander Semin, and Mike Green. While
his presence no doubt contributed to the Caps’ amazing stretch run that saw
them go 11-1-0 to close the season and reach the playoffs, it was not enough to get the Caps over the hump of the first round of the playoffs and the
Philadelphia Flyers, to whom they lost in seven games.
It was, as they say, a learning experience. It was one that the Caps put to good use in
the 2008-2009 season. Fedorov returned
to the Caps to fill the role of second line center behind Nicklas Backstrom,
and although injuries limited him to 52 games, Fedorov was still top ten on the
club in goals, assists, and points, going 11-22-33 overall. It helped the Caps finish the season with a
50-24-8 record, the first time they finished a season with 50 wins since the
1985-1986 season and only the second time in franchise history that they did so.
Their Southeast Division championship and second-place
finish in the Eastern Conference earned the Caps a first round playoff matchup
with the New York Rangers, a foe of long standing from their Patrick Division
days, but one they had not met in the postseason since falling in five games to
the eventual Stanley Cup champions in 1994.
The Caps took the 2008-2009 season series against the Blueshirts, but
that outcome is a bit deceiving. Three
of the four games were decided by one goal, two of them in extra time, the
clubs splitting those decisions. The
fourth decision, a 3-1 win by the Caps, featured an empty net goal by
Semin. These were two evenly matched
clubs.
It was not an evenly matched series at the start,
though. The Rangers delivered a serious
blow to the Caps’ chances of advancing to the second round when they took Games
1 and 2 at Verizon Center in Washington.
It did not get a lot better for Washington when they split two games at
Madison Square Garden in New York to leave them in a 1-3 deficit in games. They did, however, have the potential of
playing two of their last three games at home, should it come to that. It did.
They shutout New York, 4-0, in Game 5 at home, then went back to New
York and beat the Rangers, 5-3, to force a Game 7 in Washington.
Game 7 started in shaky fashion for the Caps. Nik Antropov scored for the Rangers just 5:35
into the contest, and the Caps did not record their first shot of the contest
until the 13:04 mark of the first period.
For a while, it seemed as if it might be their last shot of the period,
the Rangers piling up an 8-1 advantage over the first 15 minutes of the
frame. However, the Caps evened up the
contest on their second (and last) shot of the first frame on a goal by
Alexander Semin.
The teams continued to play things tight to the vest in the
second period, the Caps finishing the middle 20 minutes with nine shots but
holding the Rangers to only six. Neither
team could take the lead. In the third
period, things changed, but only to a point.
The Caps rattled the Ranger cage with shots in machine gun fashion –
four in a space of 1:36 early in the period, another three over a 1:32 span a
few minutes later. The Rangers did not
get their first shot on goal until the 9:29 mark. But that shot seemed to silence the Caps as
well. Staring at the 7:55 mark of the
period, the Caps went the next seven minutes without a shot on goal.
What happened next changed that. The Rangers were in their own end looking for
a line change. Derek Morris held the
puck in the faceoff circle to the left of goalie Henrik Lundqvist. He had an open passing lane up ice and sent
the puck to Sean Avery circling just outside the Caps’ blue line. Avery curled into the offensive zone and left
the puck for Brandon Dubinsky trailing the play while the Rangers swapped out
what players they could. Dubinsky wrong-footed
a shot that missed on the far side of Caps goalie Semyon Varlamov, the puck
skittering off into the corner and up the wall where the Caps’ Matt Bradley was
looking to get off the ice himself.
Facing the wall just inside his own blue line, Bradley
collected the puck and backhanded it to Sergei Fedorov heading up ice. Fedorov sped out of the zone and down the
right wing, backing off Ranger defenseman Wade Redden. With Redden trying to maintain position that
would keep Fedorov to the outside, Fedorov carried the puck to the right wing
circle, then slammed on the brakes, opening up a bit of daylight between Redden
and himself as Redden tried to stop and gather himself. It was just enough of an opening for Fedorov
to fire a laser of a blast that caught Lundqvist dropping into his defensive
posture a half-second too soon. The shot
sailed over Lundqvist’s glove and into the top of the net, and the arena
exploded as Alex Ovechkin tackled Fedorov in celebration along the boards with
just 4:59 left to play.
The Caps did not merely hold on in that last 4:59, they held
the Rangers without a shot on goal and limited them to a single shot for the
entire third period, outshooting them 13-1.
But it was the one goal from the stick of the wily veteran Fedorov that
made the difference and justified the trade made by the Caps more than a year
before that moment.
For Capitals fans, it was a special moment. For years, Fedorov, while he did not face the
Capitals often as a member of the Detroit Red Wings, made life for the Caps a
special kind of hell when he did. There was the time
in 1996 when he became the first Red Wing in more than half a century to score
five goals in a game, torching the Caps for five goals, including the overtime
winner, in a 5-4 win. There was the Stanley
Cup final in 1998 when he recorded the game-winning goal in Game 3 to put the
Caps on the brink of elimination, then assisted on the Red Wings’ first goal
150 seconds into Game 4 to help propel them to a 4-1 win and a sweep of the
Capitals.
For Fedorov as a Capital, it would be the only goal that he
would score in the 2009 postseason, and it would be his last goal in the
NHL. He returned to Russia the following
season, leaving a hole in the second line center position that the Capitals
spent years trying to fill. In all those
years, as difficult as it was to fill that void, there was still the memory of
that one last and memorable goal from a legend, that sent an arena into a
frenzy and the Capitals into the second round of the playoffs.
It's quarter to three,
There's no one in the place 'cept you and me
So set 'em' up joe
I got a little story I think you oughtta know
We're drinking my friend
To the end of a brief episode
So make it one for my baby
And one more for the road…
Photo: Len Redkoles/Getty Images North America
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