A TWO-point night: Caps 4 - Hurricanes 1

"M-V-P"

“Cris-to-bal”

“Nine-ty points”

“Let’s wear red!”

Pick your chant. Chances are it will apply. The Caps beat and beat on the Carolina Hurricanes, 4-1, to climb within a tie-breaker (total wins) of the visitors in the Southeast Division standings.

Red…was everywhere. If it wasn’t a Caps jersey, it was a Red Wings jersey…or a Red Sox “Schilling” t-shirt…or a woman we saw who was in red from head to toe (even her shoes). I’m guessing TV really couldn’t capture it, but the red effect was pretty amazing.

20-somethings for 20-plus…five players logged more than 20 minutes. Four of them – Mike Green, Alex Ovechkin , Nicklas Backstrom, and Jeff Schultz – are 22 or younger. Youth be served.

Young guns…Green, Ovechkin, Semin, Backstrom…19 of the Caps’ 39 shots. More like a Thompson submachine gun, if you ask me. Green had eight. In the radio post game, Steve Kolbe noted that Green told him when he stepped on the ice tonight, he was “juiced.” No kidding.

Ovechkin…he scores goals, but he also checks the replay while in the middle of a scrum (he was checking out the replay of a glorious save by Cristobal Huet while mixing it up with some Hurricanes players), and he leads cheers (as was the case when he was shown on the big screen sitting on the bench, waving his hands to get fans to cheer louder). A multi-tasker.

Speaking of Ovechkin…a goal, six shots, five hits, two takeaways…oh, and he won his only faceoff. Yup, a multi-tasker.

Good luck charm…The Caps are 16-0-1 when Jeff Schultz records a point.

Peter Laviolette…what shade was he wearing on his face after the Semin goal?…we’re thinking somewhere between crimson and Venetian red. What, not enough dives…oops, penalties called your way tonight, big guy?

4:36…total time Carolina spent on the power play, with no goal scored. On the power play, Carolina is a formidable team (eighth in the league coming into the game). Even strength?...beatable.

Balance…ten players shared 12 points. Each of the top three lines scored a goal, the occasionally-maligned second line getting a pair.

Eight…different players for Carolina took minor penalties, and that doesn’t include the bench minor, two minutes for blowing a gasket.

Eric Staal came up pretty small…no points, two shots, lost 10 of 19 faceoffs (Boyd Gordon and Sergei Fedorov won eight of nine of their draws against Staal). Or maybe it was just that he got so little support…

Three Stars…Huet, Fedorov, Cooke…trades are lookin’ pretty good, eh?

Unhinged…Carolina took nine minor penalties in the last two periods…think maybe they could see their season in danger of slipping away before their eyes?

Five…teams are now within two points of one another. Four will make the playoffs. If you’re thinking of a surprise team to slip out of it, watch Ottawa (1-4-1 in their last six games). They lost to Montreal tonight, 3-0, and finish up against Toronto and Boston. Think Toronto wouldn’t like to shove an ice pick in the Senators’ ear? On the other hand, if the Senators finish where they are right now – sixth – and the Caps overtake Carolina…

Has Alexander Semin ever played a game where he launched his body at opponents more often? He was credited with three hits…it seemed like more.

Waaaaaaaaaaaaah…Hey, Luke DeCock (aka, “Lord Stanley”)…you want some cheese to go with your whine?...

“Hurricanes coach Peter Laviolette was irate at the sequence of calls in the second period that saw Ovechkin go essentially unpunished for his run at Staal — and that was before Bret Hedican was called for roughing for a mild shove behind the net after an Ovechkin hit.

“Certainly, that sequence raised some legitimate questions about star treatment for Ovechkin.

“Now, did Staal embellish his collision with the boards, as the Capitals' broadcast apparently claimed? They showed a slo-mo replay that those who saw it said made it look like Staal leaped backward into the boards.

“But in any case, Ovechkin skated from the top of the faceoff circle to the goal line and left his feet to hit Staal. And the issue wasn’t whether Ovechkin deserved a penalty — he did — but the fact that Wallin picked up a penalty out of the scrum while no Capitals player did.

“A laughable third-period goaltender interference penalty on Ryan Bayda after he was checked into Huet by Mike Green aroused no reaction from Laviolette, who had clearly given up any hope of getting a call at that point.”

Wise beyond his years…

“I have never seen the building like that. It was great to see, and I hope the fans here enjoy it, but as a group, collectively, we haven’t done anything yet.”

-- Mike Green

Five…sellouts in the last nine home games, none of which has been attended by fewer than 17,189 (and that was the 10-2 “Boston Massacre”).

Luc Robitaille…move over, you have company at 63.

Bobby Hull…the last left winger to win the Hart…in 1966. Brett wasn’t yet two years old.

35-17-7…Bruce Boudreau’s record with the Caps. That’s a 107-point pace over 82-games. The 77 points the Caps have earned since Thanksgiving are exceeded only by one team in the East – Pittsburgh.

There’s one chant left, one that will have to wait for another day, but perhaps you should start practicing…

“South-east Champs!”

Three Games, Three Teams

The math is coming into focus more sharply…

If the Caps win out, that is, get six points to reach 94, either Boston or Philadelphia must be held to no more than two points in their last three games. In that instance, the Caps would finish with 94 points and their closest pursuer with 93.

So, when was the last time either of Boston or Philly achieved only two points or fewer in three games?

Boston: Well, it’s not that long ago. March 16-22 they played the Caps and a home and home against Montreal, losing all of them, two of them in a shootout. They also did it shortly before that – March 9-13 – losing all three games to Ottawa, the Rangers, and Tampa Bay, one of them in a shootout (to the Rangers). March 3-6 they lost all three games to the Caps, Florida, and Toronto, one of them in overtime. While Boston has righted their ship lately, somewhat (3-0-2 in their last five games), they seem at least a decent candidate to give up the points. Boston finishes as follows:

At New Jersey
At Ottawa
Buffalo

Philadelphia: The Flyers are in a similar boat. They lost three in a row to Toronto, Boston, and Pittsburgh (please note that last one), March 12-15. It was the last three of a four-game slide, the first of which was an overtime loss to Toronto. Before that, though, you’d have to go back to February 19-23 to Ottawa, San Jose, and Florida (two of them in extra time – one overtime, one shootout). Those three losses were at the end of a ten-game winless streak. The Flyers finish as follows:

At Pittsburgh
New Jersey
Pittsburgh

Meanwhile, Carolina can earn no more than three points in their last three games, providing the Caps win out. When did they last find themselves in that situation? Well, they’re in the midst of one right now. In their last three games, during which they are 1-1-1, they lost to Tampa Bay in regulation and to Washington in a shootout, while beating Atlanta. Before that, though, the Hurricanes haven’t been in a three-points-in-three games situation since February 18-21, when they beat Atlanta, but lost in regulation to New Jersey and in a shootout to Boston. Carolina finishes as follows:

At Washington
Tampa Bay
Florida

It is interesting to note that Caps fans could be subjected to one final torture…Game 82 of the Flyers’ season -- in Philadelphia against the Penguins – is a Sunday afternoon game, the Caps’ season having been completed the previous evening. If the Caps are hanging on that game as the make-or-break contest of the season, there will be no more ardent Penguin fans anywhere than the red-white-and-blue.

Sometimes, life is irony, thickly sliced on toast.

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Caps vs Hurricanes, April 1st

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

Today being April Fool’s Day, we will dispense with the usual elaborate hoax, except to entertain you with one version of the top 100 April Fool’s Day hoaxes of all time.

No, we’re going to bring you a different kind of foolishness…the sort that passed for predictions early on in this season. First, Terry Frei of ESPN on the post-season hardware…

Hart Trophy

East: Crosby; Jaromir Jagr, Rangers; Eric Staal, Hurricanes.
West: Daniel Sedin, Canucks; Thornton, Sharks; Jarome Iginla, Flames.

Who wins: Yeah, Sedin might be a reach, but after all those earlier seasons of underachievement and waiting for confirmation that the twins were worth the trouble, and with the Canucks likely to be the class of the Northwest this season, Henrik and Daniel stepped up in 2006-07. His placid demeanor works against Henrik, but with his brother's set-up help, he's on the verge of completely breaking through.

If Iginla figures out that being a leader and wearing the "C" doesn't have to mean trying to literally fight all the battles and retains his edge without being knocked off his game, all under new coach Mike Keenan, he can be the best player in the league.

But that's a big maybe.

Having Chris Drury and Scott Gomez around can't do anything but help Jagr, and Staal will have to leave his toga in his locker to be effective.

It's Crosby's trophy to lose. The Art Ross Trophy is a cold numbers game, and Crosby remains the favorite there, as well. So, fully recognizing this isn't stepping out on a limb, I'm going to pick Crosby for both.

Daniel Sedin??? His numbers this year are positively Jagresque...and that is not a Hart-stopping compliment. See anybody missing from that summary? Next, also from ESPN, we have the Bard of Steubenville, himself, John Buccigross on where the Caps would finish…

14. Washington Capitals

The waiting is the hardest part
Every day you see one more card
You take it on faith, you take it to the heart
The waiting is the hardest part

-- "The Waiting" by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

The Capitals should be better than last season. That won't be difficult as Washington won only 28 games, the second fewest in the NHL. And with the additions of Michael Nylander, Tom Poti, Viktor Kozlov and rookie Nicklas Backstrom, the Capitals will score more and improve a poor power play. But those five will do little to improve the Capitals' defense, which is what they will need to start thinking about the playoffs.

The key for a team like the Capitals is getting off to a good start and giving their young guys and Kozlov purpose in their strides. I agree with what the Capitals are doing by going with their young players. The team is giving its youngsters ample opportunity to grow, while simultaneously continuing to acquire top-level talent with high draft picks. This past summer, the Caps drafted big defenseman Karl Alzner, who continues to improve in the WHL with the Calgary Hitmen. This season, Washington will either mildly surprise by reaching the postseason or get another lottery pick.

That being said, I do believe the Capitals have a shot at the playoffs and this 14th spot might be too low. If they can get their goals up to 250 and goals against down
to 250, they should be able to earn around 90 points. That will put them in the playoff hunt. Then, they can reassess come deadline time if they want to add some defensive help in an attempt to make a stronger playoff run -- as long as they don't give up top-end value.

Capitals fans should feel good about things. Their team is getting better. They made a great uniform change. And they can read some old Washington Capitals stories in a brand new hockey book called "Jonesy: The Improbable NHL Career of Keith Jones" available everywhere now.

Well, at least he flamed the Caps gently, sort of like, “Johnny’s such a sweet boy, but he’s a little slow, you know.”

Then we had a whole panel of ESPN types weighing in – at mid-season, no less – on the Hart Trophy…

Scott Burnside: With Sidney Crosby out for the next month and a half, this race is wide open. With the Flames looking like a playoff team and the Lightning and Thrashers not, we like Jarome Iginla to win narrowly over Vincent Lecavalier and Ilya Kovalchuk. Watch out for Canucks goalie Roberto Luongo to edge into the voting.

E.J. Hradek: I'm going with Capitals star Alexander Ovechkin. A.O. is going to lead Washington to its first playoff appearance since 2003. And he just might win the Maurice Richard Trophy as the league's top goal scorer, too.

Barry Melrose: My choice is Roberto Luongo. Without him, Vancouver wouldn't nearly be a playoff team. He is just the embodiment of the award -- most valuable player to his team. Not the best player, but MVP to his team. The Canucks have no scoring, so Luongo knows he has to win games 2-1 or 1-0 almost every night.

Point to Hradek…

And in the “We Have No Idea What to Make of This” category…there is Adam Proteau of The Hockey News…

3. Washington: Few think the Caps can be this good this quick. But that's what they said about Pittsburgh last season.
• Best possible conference finish: Third in East; Worst-case scenario: 10th in East.

15. Montreal: Habs have talent, but sorely lack size, grit possessed by genuine Cup
contenders.
• Best possible conference finish: Eighth in East; Worst-case scenario: 15th in East.

Last I looked, Montreal was second in the East, after trading their top goalie. But there is still the chance on that number three seed coming true.

Motto: Prognostifying is hard...don't try this at home, kids.

Speaking of the number three seed, here we are, home again, at last. After a 5-1-0 road show, the Caps return home to make their stand. Three games, six points. It hardly gets any simpler than that.

As for tonight, the opponent looks a little too much like the Caps, and we don’t mean the dominating role that red plays in the uniform. The Hurricanes haven’t lost consecutive games in regulation since February 2-5 (Pittsburgh, Nashville). They haven’t lost consecutive games in regulation to Southeast Division opponents since November 14-16 (Tampa Bay, Atlanta). They haven’t lost consecutive games to the Caps in regulation since January 21-March 25, 2006.

Tonight, Carolina can do all of that. And for the Caps to have any chance of winning the Southeast, that is precisely what has to happen – the Hurricanes must be beaten in regulation. Failing that, the Caps must have the two points to climb to within a point of idle Boston and Philadelphia.

We provided much of the background for this game here, when the clubs played last Monday in Carolina. With respect to the series played in Washington, here is how the Caps have fared:

Record: 2-1-0
Goals for/against: 8-4
Power Play: 4/15 (26.7%)
Penalty killing: 12/12 (100%)

Capitals scoring:

Alex Ovechkin: 3-0-3, even, one GWG
Michael Nylander: 1-2-3, -2, one GWG
Nicklas Backstrom: 0-3-3, -1
Alexander Semin: 1-1-2, +2
Mike Green: 1-0-1, +2
Boyd Gordon: 1-0-1, +2
Milan Jurcina: 1-0-1, -2
Tom Poti: 0-1-1, even
Shaone Morrisonn: 0-1-1, +1
David Steckel: 0-1-1, even
Viktor Kozlov: 0-1-1, +2
John Erskine: 0-1-1, even

While the Caps have had their difficulties in Carolina (the results of the last game – a 3-2 shootout win – notwithstanding), they have played quite well against the Hurricanes in Washington. Even in the loss, they played rather well, despite falling behind 2-0 in the first 15 minutes.

If you’re looking for a Cap to shine tonight, we’re thinking Alexander Semin is the guy to watch. 12-8-20 in 18 career games against the Hurricanes, with a goal and an assist in two games this season. You might expect (as if we don’t in most games these days) some production from Alex Ovechkin, too (16-12-28 in 23 career games against Carolina). In goal, it looks as if Cristobal Huet will get the call once more, and he’s been money against the Hurricanes, too: 4-2-0 (with one tie), 2.30, .931 career; and 3-1-0, 2.45, .924 this year against Carolina.

We’re going to go out on a limb, too…Milan Jurcina scored a goal in the home opener. He hasn’t had any since. He breaks the string tonight…

Caps 4 – Hurricanes 1

Baseball?...the best sport?...yeah, well...sez you.

For those of you with a political commentary bent, you are probably familiar with the commentary of E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post.

In this silliest of seasons in which the Republic is desperately trying to figure out who shall stand as the major parties' candidates for its highest office, E.J. takes a turn down another road in his "Precinct" discussion at the Post. He forms his thesis in a question...

To wit..."Is baseball the best sport?"

The baseball season dawns, a great thing for many of us. I disgree with my colleague George Will on many questions, but I love his baseball writing and his partisanship on behalf of the sport. "Baseball, which provides satisfying finality and then does it again the next day, is a severe meritocracy that illustrates the axiom that there is very little difference between men but that difference makes a big difference," he writes in a delightful column on the new season. (By the way, is that a conservative thought?) It's a risky question while so many are watching the Final Four -- though the four consist of four No. 1 seeds. (Is that a bad thing?) So please grapple with any of the questions offered in the course of this post, and the basic one: Is baseball the best sport?

Once upon a time, I would have answered in the affirmative. Baseball -- in its purest form -- is a remarkable combination of individual and group activity. A unique example of some of the most difficult skills to master in all of sport played at a leisurely pace that invites contemplation and reflection.

But that was then...

Today? No, it's not the best sport. The major league flavor of the sport is a bloated, corrupt, money-addled melodrama where as much news is made outside the diamond as on it, little of it good. It is played by too many individuals with too large a sense of entitlement, managed by too many individuals with too little imagination, chronicled by too many individuals with too little love for the game.

It still draws many -- millions, in fact -- to the stands, but perhaps more out of a sense of its grand history that its scandalized present.

Nope...even with the thrilling grand opening of Nationals Park last night, we'd still choose our "adopted" sport of ice hockey.

Skill? Hitting a round ball with a round bat, squarely, might yet be -- as Ted Williams professed -- the hardest single thing to do in sports. But we'd be hard to convince that the average major league baseball player is a superior athlete to the average NHL hockey player. While baseball requires superior hand-eye coordination, reflexes, speed and quickness, and occasionally strength, hockey requires these magnified. To that add "anticipation." Whether one thinks of it as "vision" or "hockey sense," the ability to think ahead quickly separates the hockey player from the baseball player.

There is the game itself. Both are played in the context of ever-changing geometries...the curve of a pitch, the ball played off the wall...a one-timer, the angling of a skater off the puck. But hockey is played at such a ferocious pace compared to that of baseball. Even in its slower moments, the pace of the action dazzles compared to the every-fifteen-seconds of action pace of baseball.

There is the aura of mystery that surrounds baseball that is more pretentious than it would admit. "Seamheads" who can spout obscure statistics as measures of a player's or team's effectiveness..."on-base plus slugging percentage"..."batting average with runners in scoring position after the sixth inning"..."quality starts"...the whole "Sabermetric" fog that separates the "real" baseball fan from the great unwashed. It has the clarity of pudding and divides its fans into the knowledgable and the not so.

Hockey is more egalitarian (although it is seems to be moving into its own "Sabermetric" dimension). Even the most casual fan can appreciate a big hit, an end-to-end rush, a cross-ice pass.

Once upon a time, baseball had personality. Dizzy, Pee Wee, Three-Finger, Big Train, The Scooter. It had players that dazzled on the field -- and off -- and did so leaving their own imprint of character (and they certainly were characters). These days? Players that aren't finding themselves as the subject of lurid tabloid stories suffer a cookie-cutter sameness...Alex Rodriguez is a sublime talent, and is (well, maybe) a pillar of the baseball community, but he has all the programmed personality of an animatronic display.

Hockey still has its odd balls. Goalies as a class could probably qualify (ok, you go stand in front of a net throwing yourself in front of 100-mile-an-hour pucks).

You, no doubt, could think of a dozen reasons why hockey is better. We'll boil it down to one. Baseball is the best sport one day a year -- Opening Day. Hockey has the Stanley Cup tournament...two months of unrelenting suspense and drama.

Case closed.

Take Me Out to the Ball Game...

Yesterday being a day without Caps hockey, The Peerless had a ticket to the Nationals’ home opener at Nationals [Corporate Name to be Selected Later] Park.

And what a nice park it is.

It does not have the instant charm of a Camden Yards with its distinctive warehouse façade looming in right field, or the scenic panoramas of PNC Park in Pittsburgh or AT&T Park in San Francisco.

But this is a ballpark that will age nicely and take its place in the roster of monuments this city has to offer.

We took Metro – the local subway provider – which was pretty much a given, given the predictions of the apocalypse with respect to close-in parking. The trip was pleasant – a train largely filled with Nats fans, even if it was several hours before the scheduled first pitch.

Upon exiting the train at the Navy Yard station – the closest to the ball park – the process of getting out of the station (which can be a chore even on a rush hour weekday) went as smoothly as one could hope, although the same might not be said of those in the escalator next to the one that I was riding, which was shut down in mid-transit, requiring a decent walk up the stairs.

The exit at Half Street (honest, there is a “Half Street”) was rather packed. For a moment, I thought of the “hot gates” of the movie, “300,” where hordes were funneled into a tight aperture of a path. But things went relatively smoothly, even when we arrived at the center field gate, where security was in force in anticipation of the arrival of the President for the inaugural “first pitch.”

The visual impression of the ball park was certainly not unusual for anyone who has been to Camden Yards, especially as one enters from the north end of Eutaw Street at that ball park. A pavilion empties into the lower seating bowl and playing field that are both below street level. It creates a sense of openness that one could never achieve in the multi-tiered donut of RFK Stadium. If anything, it reminded us a little bit of the Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia, although Nationals Park is even more open in its concourses.

The concourses are wide, if oddly angled in places. The concession stands are numerous, although some could use additional space (the lines at Ben’s Chili Bowl and Five Guys were extraordinarily long, for example, even hours before the first pitch). For the record, we sampled the chili dog at the Hard Times Café. We’ll give it “three stars” (the bun didn’t hold up very well to the chili).

We were in the stadium long enough before the first pitch to be able to tour the entire circuit around each level. It has something of the look of an unfinished ballpark (especially the rest rooms, for some reason…maybe it was the concrete flooring), but not so much as we might have anticipated. The concourses provide fans with the chance to keep up with the action as they are largely open to the field, another significant departure from RFK. And, the concourses provide quite a panorama of DC, as one looks out from the stadium, from just about any vantage in the ball park. It isn’t a bad place to just take a stroll and look across the city, especially from the upper level.

Entering the seating area (our seats were in the 400-level), there was that sense of openness, but also one of being rather close to the action. The upper deck seems higher than RFK (owing to the suites below), but not so much that one feels detached from the action. But the attention-grabber was the scoreboard. It is all it was represented as being, in all its high-definition grandeur. In fact, it became a bit of a distraction at times, as one might have been drawn to it and away from the action on the field. As time goes on, we suspect this temptation will subside.

The seats were comfortable, as such things go, wide enough for those of us of a certain age (and gravity-challenged physique), and angled to the action on the field. The only problem was not architectural, but climatological – it was cold. Temperatures were in the 40’s, and there was a bit of a breeze up top, which made the choice of hooded sweat-shirt and gloves a wise one.

We will not belabor the details of the game, which you no doubt have already read or heard about. The President threw out the first pitch – a fitting occurrence, no matter one’s opinion of his tenure. The teams struggled with the offensive aspects of the game, and when things reached their climax, Ryan Zimmerman’s walk-off home run was a fitting end to the inaugural game.


This being a “late” game (an 8:15 start), Metro seemed to have caught a break. Since this is, after all, Washington, the stands started emptying around the sixth inning as folks tried to beat traffic in anticipation of the work day the following day. So, by the time the game ended, just after 11:00 pm, the stadium was probably filled by what was more likely the sort of crowd that will be more common. Good thing…as fans filed out of the center field gate, they were funneled into that Half Street pass, which made the half-block walk to the Navy Yard station rather slow. Slow though it was, it moved steadily, and once at the station, it was of little problem to get through the fare gates and to the trains (would that a rush hour experience be as smooth on a regular basis). The trains were moved along – as one filled and left the station, another took its place. Generally, at least from our experience, Metro passed this test rather well.

The test of the ball park isn’t Opening Night – all ball parks look like palaces in that first blush of a first-ever game. And what glitches there were seem less “systemic” than merely a result of the “newness” of the ball park, where people have to find the game-day routines that work for them. The test will be in May…and June…and July, when that first blush wears off. But we think this ballpark will fare quite well in that regard. The Nats have hit a home run with Nationals Park.

photos: Drew Hallowell/Getty Images

Bourquevechkin!

Chris Bourque had quite a night for himself at Giant Center in Hershey. He had four goals for the Bears in a 5-2 win over the Hamilton Bulldogs. He is the fourth player to accomplish the feat in the AHL this season.

Grant MacNeill also had a goal -- his first in the AHL.

And Hamilton?...last year's Calder Cup champ?...at the Bears' expense? Well, they've taken it in the teeth lately, going 0-10-2 in their last dozen games.

Long Distance Haymakers

Well, if they couldn't play much against one another, the four teams battling for the last three playoff spots in the Eastern Conference (including the Southeast title) have been throwing haymakers at one another from long distance, looking at their respective records since March 1:

Whoever gets in will have earned it.

A TWO-point night: Caps 3 - Panthers 0

End o’ the road...

And what a road trip it was. It was the first time the Caps won five games on a road trip since 2001-2002, when they won five games of an eight game trip in March 2002. You’d have to go back to February 2001 to find a road trip where the Caps earned more points (11 of 12 available points in a six-game trip).

By any standard, this trip was a wild success. The capstone to it all was a 3-0 whitewashing of the Florida Panthers tonight, eliminating the Panthers from the post season and leaving the Caps still within striking distance of several teams – Carolina, Philadelphia, Boston, and the New York Rangers. The Caps are still mathematically capable of climbing as high as fourth, New Jersey currently occupying that spot five points ahead of Washington.

Tonight’s game might be characterized by the word, “workmanlike.” A team having spent five games away from home, even if the “road trip” was broken into two pieces, might be excused for being a bit leg- and jet-weary in the sixth and last game of that journey. Add to that an ice surface that had the look of pea gravel for the way the puck was rolling and jumping around, and it made for a difficult circumstance for the visitors.

It looked as if all these things might conspire to leave the Caps short tonight, and it looked a bit disconcerting when the teams skated off at the first intermission in a scoreless tie. It was more frustrating in that the Caps had three power plays, although one was shortened by a penalty of their own, and another shortened by the end of the period. Still, despite adequate man-advantage situations and outshooting the Panthers, 10-6, the Caps couldn’t find the back of the net.

Frankly, we thought it a case of too much one-on-one, individualistic activity. There was little in the way of crisp passing attempted, let alone completed. Too often, a Cap was caught trying to weave around a Panther defense that seemed to want to clog the middle with five defenders.

As sluggishly as the Caps played in the first, it almost got worse in the first minute of the second period. While shorthanded, Josef Stumpel picked up a loose puck near the Panther bench and skated in alone on Caps goalie Cristobal Huet. Stumpel angled in and tried to beat Huet over his glove, but Huet was up to the task, getting enough leather on the puck to turn it aside. The play might have had a different ending had Rostislav Olesz not more or less given up on the play, choosing to trail Stumpel into the zone rather than jump into the play to make it a two-on-none.

The save appeared to wake the Caps up. Two minutes later, Viktor Kozlov circled out of the right wing corner with the puck. He chipped it to Brooks Laich, but the puck was knocked back to Kozlov, who turned and rifled the puck past Panther goalie Tomas Vokoun to give the Caps the lead.

Now it was Florida’s turn to look lethargic. With just under ten minutes left in the second, Alex Ovechkin had the puck behind the net. With all eyes – including the five Florida defenders, it seemed – fixed on him, Ovechkin found Nicklas Backstrom steaming unimpeded down the slot. Backstrom’s drive was blocked on a fabulous save by Vokoun, but it only delayed the inevitable.

As the clock was winding under five minutes to go in the second, Ovechkin won a battle for the puck with Nathan Horton in the corner. Ovechkin skated out along the boards, leaving the puck for Kozlov, who returned the puck to Ovechkin skating toward the goal line. Ovechkin snapped a pass across the crease to a left-alone Mike Green, who wasted no time depositing the puck behind a helpless Vokoun for a 2-0 lead.

Ovechkin closed the scoring in the third, taking advantage of what looked like a spent Panther team. When Kozlov carried the puck to the Panther net, only to be turned aside by Vokoun at the doorstep, three Panthers failed to locate the puck at their feet. Ovechkin peeled it away and wristed the puck past Vokoun before any of the Panther defenders could react.

The selection of the stars of the game was a curious thing – the goal scorers being picked – although the curiosity was more in the order than of the players selected. We’d have had Kozlov as the number one star and Ovechkin as the third star. We would have reserved a spot for Cristobal Huet, who made the pivotal play of the game – the stop on Stumpel, after which everything else unfolded.

If you’re looking for one of the great oddities of the game, it is in who was on the ice for the Panthers for each Capitals goal...

Skrastins, Weiss, Booth, Horton, Johansson
Skrastins, Weiss, Booth, Horton, Bouwmeester
Skrastins, Weiss, Booth, Horton, Bouwmeester

...stopping the Caps’ top line might have been in the game plan for these guys, but that isn’t the way it turned out. The top line went 2-3-5, +7. They had 14 of the 33 shots, and when Mike Green’s five shots are added, there were almost two thirds of the shots accounted for.

There were a few other bouquets to pass around in this one...

Eric Fehr might not have shown up on the score sheet, but it was not for lack of effort. In a little less than nine minutes, he managed three shots (one of which required a fine stop by Vokoun to keep out ofthe net) and three hits. He was battling all night behind the Florida net.

Donald Brashear had three hits in eight minutes and looked as if he was engaging in a non-stop yap-fest with a couple of the Panthers.

Tom Poti had a couple of assists, a couple of hits in 22-plus minutes.

Jeff Schultz had a “Jeff Schultz” kind of game...unnoticeable, and that’s a good thing. Two hits, a blocked shot, plus-two, and no goals scored on his watch.

At this point, given the timing of the last three games, one would have to conclude that Huet will get the last three starts. 8-2-0, less than 2.00 GAA, save percentage over .930. It would be hard to give him a seat at this point.

For the Panthers, who is it skating in that #12 jersey? It might look like Olli Jokinen, but it doesn’t look like Olli Jokinen. Perhaps the announcers had a point when they said Jokinen hasn’t been the same since his skate sliced open Richard Zednik’s neck. He’s 4-8-12, -11, in 20 games since that night (including tonight)...not Jokinenesque.

Nathan Horton – the second leading goal scorer and overall scorer for the Panthers – had no shots on goal...none.

Kamil Kreps, heretofore a “Cap killer” this year – also had no shots on goal...none.

There weren’t a lot of hockey cognoscenti who would have thought the Caps would still be in the playoff race as they anticipate playing their 80th game on Tuesday. But here they are, two points out of a playoff spot. They still need help. Someone has to beat the Flyers at least once; twice would be better. Same for the Bruins. The Caps have to beat Carolina and get help to win the Southeast. But the Caps have done their part. If they do it, they will not have backed in, not with the last month-plus they’ve had – 12-4-0 in their last 16 games. They’ve put themselves in a position to make some noise if they should get into the playoffs, but the getting there will make for one helluva week on the way. With all apologies to the Nationals and their new ball park opening this week (we’ll be there tomorrow night), the Caps making a stand at home is the big story this coming week.

He's a-leavin' on a jet plane...well, maybe

The New York Daily News reports that Jaromir Jagr might be of a mind to scratch his itch to play in a city in which he "has been unabashed in his affection for..."

No, Caps fans, not Washington...no, Pens fans, not Pittsburgh.


Omsk

That's right, Omsk...the one in Siberia.

John Delapina reports for the Daily News...

Next week, Jagr will get the chance to lay the groundwork for just such a return - or, at least, continue a dialogue that never has been interrupted - when he meets with Anatoly Bardin, the new general manager for Avangard-Omsk of the Russian Super League.

Bardin is flying to New York this weekend. And according to his team's Web site, "The main objective of the visit are the negotiations with the Czech forward Jaromir Jagr of the Rangers about his possible return to the 'Vanguard.'"

We're guessing that option thing is dead.

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Caps vs. Panthers, March 29th

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

Well, here we are, at the end of the road…the last of the six game trip, the last road game of the regular season.

And tonight, it’s the Florida Panthers to close the road show. And to get a take on this one, we looked up one of the world’s great investigators…Inspector Jacques Clouseau. Inspector?...Inspector!

“Ehm sorree…Eh was on ze pheun…”

Ze pheun?

“Yes…ze pheun…ze pheun…I was taking a call on ze pheun...I am ze famous Inspector Clouseau, et yerr service.”

Also known as zee Ping...uh, the Pink Panther.

“I hate zat nemm...and who are yeu?”

The Peerless Prognosticator…

“We zeem to have too much pee here…”

Pee?...

“yes, pee…Pink Panther Peerless Prognosticateur.”

Oh, ok, I get it…now, about the Panthers, what can you tell us Inspector?

“Ah…more pee…well, zey are a ‘ockey team…”

I KNOW that…that’s what we do here…hockey.

"I zee...and what deu yeu deu?"

What do I do?

“Yes, yeu deu…”

Well, I have this blog, you see.

“Block?...are yeu aware zat a block is a deadly weapon in ze hands of an eggzpert?”

Not ‘block’…blog…web log…an online site to write about…oh, never mind…now, about the Panthers...

“A large cat, nehtive to ze Florida area…”

No, the hockey team…

“Zey train panthers to play ‘ockey?”

No, you twit! The panthers are the mascot for the Florida hockey team.

“Do zey know it is not legal to keep panthers?”

They don’t have actual panthers, it’s the name of the hockey team…

“Zhouldn’t zey have a hockey name, like ze ‘bucks?’”

Bucks?

“bucks…ze little rubbehr bucks…”

The Florida Pucks?...we’re getting nowhere here…

“Zo, zen…where are we going?”

We’re going to get to the contest…and what the Caps have a chance to do here is not only climb to within a tie breaker of Boston, should Boston lose in regulation to Ottawa (Boston would still be in eighth by virtue of having played fewer games), the Caps can put the Panthers out of their misery with a win in regulation.

This will not, however, be an easy task. Florida brings two pieces of history into this game that suggest a difficult night. First, despite having lost their last two, the Panthers are 8-2-1 in their last 11 games. Here’s the breakdown:

Record: 8-2-1
Goals for/against: 28/18
Power play: 8/43 (18.6%)
Penalty killing: 39/43 (90.7%)

Over the last 11 games, the Panthers have done it with defense, which harbors its own problems, but we’ll get to that. 18 goals in 11 games (1.64/game) is remarkable, especially in that it represents more than one goal per game less than the Panthers’ season figure (2.68). And while they’ve had the benefit of playing some teams that have been offensively challenged from time to time (Boston, the Rangers, Atlanta, a slumping Lightning team), they’ve also managed to hold the Hurricanes and Penguins in check, too. And that brings us to goaltending and…

That would qualify as pretty solid. It’s had to be. The Florida offense – with those 28 goals (2.55) are slightly off their already only 20^th ranked average for the year (2.60). There is the good and the bad to that offense. First, the good…it’s been balanced among the top scorers in the last 11 games:

Olli Jokinen: 3-6-9, -4
Nathan Horton: 5-3-8, +7
Stephen Weiss: 3-3-6, +6
David Booth: 3-4-7, +7
Brett McLean: 4-8-12, -1
Rostislav Olesz: 3-2-5, -2

That’s 21 of the Panthers’ 28 goals spread across six players. OK, the bad…no one seems to be stepping up to lead the offense to the next level. One would think that being on the brink of elimination would raise some games (Jokinen comes to mind). Whether a slump, squeezing the sticks too tightly, missing Richard Zednik (still the 7^th leading scorer, having missed 24 games this year and out indefinitely with the neck injury suffered against Buffalo)…whatever. The margin of error that the offense is leaving for its defense and goaltending is too thin to sustain.

And cracks have started to show. In each of the two games the Panthers have allowed more than two goal in these last 11 games, they lost in regulation – the last two games, in fact, to Tampa Bay and Atlanta, neither of which have had much to play for lately.

But that is the last 11 games, none of which have been played against Washington. And that brings us to the second piece of history. The Panthers have been a fang in the side of the Caps all year. In fact, the key word for the season series, from the Caps’ perspective, is “frustrating.” Here is the breakdown of the series through six games:

Caps’ record: 2-3-1
Goals for/against: 14/15
Power play: 5/25 (20.0%)
Penalty killing: 22/25 (88.0%)
Record in one goal games: 1-2-1

You’ll note that one-goal game record. In fact, in the other loss – a 4-2 loss in Florida on February 15^th – the Caps gave up an empty netter in the last minute for the final margin. So close…so far (kind of like the standings at the moment). Here is how that same group noted above has fared against the Caps in six games (unless otherwise noted) this year:

Olli Jokinen: 3-2-5, +1
Nathan Horton: 1-1-2, +2
Stephen Weiss: five games, 0-2-0, +1
David Booth: 2-1-3, +2
Brett McLean: two games, 0-0-0, even
Rostislav Olesz: four games, 1-0-1, -1

There isn’t a scoring line that comes screaming off the page, but it has been just good enough to frustrate the Caps often enough. In fact, if there is one player to watch, it would be Kamil Kreps. He’s 3-1-4, +3, against the Caps this year. He also has two game-winning goals against the Caps, his only two game-winners this year.

As for the goalies, Vokoun has been the goalie of record in all six games, going 4-2-0, 2.31, .930. One would expect he’ll get the nod once more this evening.

The Caps lost ground to the Flyers last night in another of those infernal three-point games, losing in a shootout to New Jersey. The Caps are now three points behind Philadelphia for seventh in the East, two points behind Boston for eighth (the Bruins holding a game in hand). Boston hosts Ottawa tonight.

So, the pressure is still on. The Caps have responded well to it…well, fairly well. Shoot, let’s just say well, because the only thing that matters, no matter how it is accomplished, is earning two points each time they take the ice. And the Caps have done that in 11 of their last 15 games. We think they’ll make it 12 of 16 to make the upcoming home stand the most meaningful in years.

Caps 3 – Panthers 1

Maybe it's coincidence...

...maybe not, but since the trading deadline, here are your Caps:

Record: 10-4-0
Goals for/against: 45-31
Power play: 15/58 (25.9%)
Penalty killing: 46/60 (76.7%)
Record in one goal-games: 4-2-0 (including extra-time games)

Sergei Fedorov: 1-7-8, -5 (58.6% on faceoffs)

Matt Cooke: 2-3-5, +1 (in 13 games, compared to 2-5-7, -11, for the guy he replaced -- Matt Pettinger -- in 56 games)

Cristobal Huet: 7-2-0, 2.03, .922 (no games with more than three goals allowed)


Has what transpired at the deadline, perhaps, if only by coincidence, kick-started others to a higher level?...

Alex Ovechkin: 13-12-25, +16 (one hat trick, two game-winning goals)

Viktor Kozlov: 3-6-9, +15 (12 of 14 games on the plus side)

Matt Bradley: 4-2-6, +3 (a game-winning goal and perhaps a higher level of pestitude)

Nicklas Backstrom: 5-11-16, +13 (two game-winners)

Brooks Laich: 7-4-11, -1 (one game-winner, nine games at least 50% on draws)

Olaf Kolzig: 3-2-0, 2.27, .912 (only seven even-strength goals allowed)


Chemistry, a balanced recipe, whatever...we're just sayin'

A TWO-point night: Caps 4 - Lightning 3 (OT)

When a team is down a goal with the clock winding down under five minutes to go in the game, its playoff hopes bleeding into bad ice, and they come back…not just to steal a point, but to win in overtime, it is tempting to say that there is a sense of destiny about that team.

We are a bit more pragmatic than that. The fact is, that team just wasn’t very good.

The Capitals – clearly the better team for long stretches of play last night – clawed their way off the St. Pete Times Forum ice with a 4-3 overtime win over the Tampa Bay Lightning last night. It wasn’t pretty.

There was a curious lack of urgency in the Caps’ play for the first 45-50 minutes, or about the time it took for the Lightning – with nothing to play for but an opportunity to play spoiler – to take a 3-2 lead.

Tampa Bay had a rather simple game plan to deal with the Caps’ firepower, especially its top line…keep things to the outside. If the ESPN shot chart can be believed, they largely succeeded.





More to the point, they kept the top line quiet, mainly by keeping them above the faceoff dots in their shots. Here is the spread of the top line of Alex Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom, and Viktor Kozlov:

And what that meant is that other players, in the end – literally, as it would turn out – had to step up.

Sergei Fedorov…watching this guy is like watching an old actor conjure up solid performance after solid performance. He might not have the spellbinding talent of years gone by, but his professionalism and moxie accumulated through years of experience in these situations shines through. While shorthanded, he marked Vincent Lecavalier in the Caps zone, forcing the Lightning center to pull up, then to lose his balance in coughing up the puck. It squirted to Brooks Laich, who fed the puck back to Fedorov gliding through the neutral zone. Fedorov tried to drop the puck for Laich as they entered the Tampa Bay zone, but the puck was poked away. Fedorov collected the puck once more, and with two Lightning defenders paying more attention to him than to Laich, he threaded a pass between them to Laich closing in on the Tampa Bay net. Laich flipped the puck over goalie Karri Ramo’s right pad into the net, and the Caps had a lead, largely due to Fedorov’s virtuosity.

Fedorov also authored the game-tying goal late in the third, as he has on a number of occasions, by winning a key offensive zone faceoff. He did so by beating Tampa Bay center Craig MacDonald with a spin move off the faceoff, giving him a chance to pass the puck, more or less, to Alexander Semin at the top of the right wing circle. Semin fired the puck in one motion past a late-to-react Ramo, and the Caps were breathing again.

Crisotbal Huet…he did not have his best game as a Cap, but he made several top notch saves to keep the Caps in it. He was especially hard on Lecavalier, who had four shots in the contest – three of them of the sort requiring Huet to make sparkling stops. The Lightning center was left on a couple of occasions staring into the ice or gazing into the rafters in frustration.

Brook Laich…sure, he had the goal – his 20th of the season – and he had an assist, too, but he was also 7-for-11 in the faceoff circle and had an otherwise pretty solid game.

Matt Bradley…had a goal that was odd, to say the least, mostly because of how much time and space he was accorded in getting it. Tom Poti edged down the left wing side and let a shot go. It hit a Lightning stick and popped into the air. Bradley, standing with his back to the net at the edge of the left wing faceoff circle, reached up, caught the puck and dropped it at his feet, stepped out to collect it on his stick, spun, and fired it past Ramo. He could have used some help, though, in his post-goal celebration…he looked as if he was struggling to extract his stick from his posterior regions…ouch.

Tomas Fleischmann…well, if David Steckel is out (4-2-6, +4, in six games against Tampa Bay this year), then Fleischmann will do as a Lightning-killer. Fleischmann’s game-winner in overtime put him at 4-1-5, +1, in seven games against the Lightning this year. If the Caps should find a way to finish in the top-eight, his backing-up, falling-down, hurry-up-and-put-the-puck-on-my-stick-Brooks goal at 2:27 of the extra frame will be one of the highlights. Good thing, too…in the 60-minute portion of the game, he wasn’t making a case for being a top-six forward.

Nicklas Backstrom…he might not have had a productive night on the scoresheet, but he was spotless in the circle, winning all five draws. Part of the trick over a long season is in doing the other, little things, when the goals and assists aren’t coming. Backstrom does that as well as anyone could expect for one so young. It’s even more amazing in that Backstrom has now played more than 30 more regular season games than in any of his previous seasons.

In case you were wondering, Alex Ovechkin played every second of Caps power play time last night – all 4:05.

On the other side, it’s no fluke that the Halpern-Ouellet-Darche line has been the most productive one lately for the Lightning. They were the best the Lightning had to offer last night.

Did Martin St. Louis dress last night? It was perhaps the quietest performance by the diminutive one in his career against the Caps…one shot, -1 in 23:39.

Oh, and nothing beats watching John Tortorella blow a gasket yapping at the referees from the bench (especially when, in fact, he had a point…Mike Green didn’t bust a gut to retrieve a puck that was called icing, which led to the Caps tying goal off the ensuing faceoff). Small consolation, but we suspect the Florida Panthers might smile at the thought, too.

Dan Boyle…we noted yesterday his getting whacked in the head by a teammate’s skate in practice. We didn’t know it would be prelude. On the game winner by Fleischmann, Boyle was sliced in the neck by Mike Green’s skate. It might have been worse – much worse – had Green’s skate not first grazed Boyle’s sternum. Boyle things up in tidy fashion, with respect to his own season, but perhaps that of his team as well…"Just a miserable year. What else can happen?"

We’re pretty much down to nine teams jockeying for eight spots. Buffalo – in tenth – would have to make up five points with five games to play…not good arithmetic. The Caps are that ninth team, still two points out of a playoff spot. But the possibilities multiplied with the win last night. The Caps find themselves only two points behind three other teams. All of those teams – Carolina, Philadelphia, and Boston – have a game in hand on the Caps. But the thing is, the Caps continuing to win puts added pressure on those teams to win that game in hand, and with multiple teams in that situation, the chances that all of them will succeed diminish.

The Caps have been in “playoff elimination” mode for a couple of weeks now. As sphincter-tightening as such situations are, there is no better preparation for what lies ahead, if they could just get into the top-eight. If the Caps were a team no one might have wanted to play in the first round in the first place, they are that much tougher for having been hardened in the grind of this road trip, one on which they are now 4-1-0. There is one more to go on this swing, and while we’d like to see the Caps play better than they have in the last two games – both settled in extra time – we’re also pragmatic in another sense…

Two points is two points.

What they're saying in...Tampa

"Players are scared of him. People don't want to hit him. If you're trying to stop someone from scoring and you're scared to bump into him because you don't want to end up on the highlights getting run over by him, it makes him pretty hard to defend.''

-- Tampa Bay forward Jeff Halpern on Alex Ovechkin



"If I wasn't wearing my helmet...''

-- Lightning defenseman Dan Boyle, after being kicked in the head by teammate Andreas Karlsson's skate during Wednesday's practice.



"I make no bones about it, I'm not crazy about the organization. I don't mind that at all. It looks good on 'em.''

-- Tampa Bay coach John Tortorella, speaking about the Florida Panthers after his club defeated them, 3-1 on Tuesday.



"We have to do more evaluation.''

-- Vincent Lecavalier on the condition of his left wrist, which could keep him out of the World Championships



"I'll play hard [Thursday], that's for sure. I might have a little extra care about what goes on in that game."

-- Halpern, on playing his former club tonight.

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Caps vs. Lightning, March 27th

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

Well, you can count the games left on one hand. Last September seems like yesterday afternoon, and we’re almost to the end already. But there is work to be done, and the Caps will get to it tonight against the Tampa Bay Lightning.

With five games left, two points to make up on Boston, four on Philadelphia and Carolina, we’re left with a simple question…”can they or can’t they?” Well, we could go to hockey pundits and get their wise take, but you can go read about that. Nope, we’re going right to the source…the Magic 8-ball.

Our first question…

Will Alex Ovechkin hold off Evgeni Malkin for the scoring title?

“You believe this crap?”

Why, it’s Cheerless Prognosticator, our hang-dog cousin who never saw a sunny day he didn’t think would turn into a thunderstorm.

“Yeah, yeah…what about this 8-ball stuff?”

We professional prognosticators use every tool…

“…you mean every trick.”

…every tool at our disposal.

“Hey, Cheerless, knock it off…I wanna see how this comes out.”

“Fearless, you’re as dumb as a bucket o’ rocks.”

OK, back to the prognostifying…

Will the Caps win at least four of their last five games?

“You get a deal on 8-balls, cuz?”

“Looks honest to me, Cheerless.”

You’re breaking the fog of mystery here, guys.

“That ain’t fog…that’s last night’s bratwurst.”

Okay, okay…will the Caps overtake the Bruins?

“Why don’t you ask it if the sun will rise in the east?”

“Shhh…don’t spoil it, Cheerless.”

Will the Caps overtake the Flyers?

“Can I ask it one?”

Sure, Fearless, give it a shot…

“Will David Archuleta win ‘American Idol?’”

Hey, let’s stick to hockey, ok? Who will the Caps play in the first round of the playoffs?

That’s looking far into the future…too far for our purposes, even if Penguin fans are drooling at the prospect. Tonight, it’s Tampa, and the Lightning have gone from playoff contender to lottery team faster than you can say, “Tortorella.”

On Valentine’s Day, the Lightning beat the Flyers, 5-3, to haul themselves to within two games of .500. Then, they lost their next game to the Caps, 3-2, on a late goal from Alexander Semin, which sent them spinning toward Lotteryville…

Record (since February 14^th): 5-11-2
Goals for/against: 45-56
Power play: 13/62 (21.0%)
Penalty killing: 58/69 (84.1%)
Record in one-goal games: 1-4-2

Tampa hasn’t been awful, and there is a caution in this for the Caps. They have merely been consistent…consistently good enough to lose often. Except for a three game winning streak from March 11^th through March 15^th, Tampa has shown themselves adept at stringing losses together…an 0-4-1 streak from February 16^th through February 27^th…another 0-4-1 streak from March 1^st through March 9^th…a three game losing streak from March 19^th through March 22^nd.

When one thinks of the Lightning, what comes to mind immediately is goaltending, and the problems they’ve had with it. The odd thing, though, is that Tampa’s goals-per-game allowed over the last 18 games (3.11/game) is lower than their season figure (3.22/game, 29^th in the league). This is not to say that their goaltending has been good, just that it is not the only problem.

Well, if we're interested in finding a problem, let’s start with even-strength scoring. Tampa has been outscored 43-31 at even strength over these last 18 games. Getting outscored by two-thirds of a goal a game at even-strength is a sure-fire way to sink in the standings. And that 31 goals scored should be a concern (1.82/game) as well. How bad is the even-strength performance? The individual performances tell the story…

Vincent Lecavalier: 8-6-14, -17 (no, we’re not kidding)
Martin St. Louis: 2-7-9, -19 (honest)
Dan Boyle: 1-12-13, -17 (no, really…)
Paul Ranger: 0-4-4, -8 (yeesh…)

And did coming in new to the Lightning at the trade deadline make a difference? …well, Jussi Jokinen is 14 games, 1-9-10, -10, in 14 games after coming over from Dallas.

We’re thinking Brad Richards (2-7-9, -2 since joining Dallas) and Vaclav Prospal (3-8-11, +5 in 14 games since joining the Flyers) were not the problems.

On the other hand, Jeff Halpern, who also came over from Dallas, is 7-8-15, +4 in 13 games, and Michel Ouellet is 9-5-14, +7 since February 16^th for the Lightning. But if it's these guys leading the way, there is a problem.

As poorly as the top guys have been over the last six weeks, once has to wonder, have they simply tuned out their coach? It’s a question that seems reasonable to ask, and one that might get some attention in the off season. Tampa lacks for a balance of talent, but that's hardly a new development. They’ve been in a nose-dive in the last month with key players who are just a few years removed from a Stanley Cup and still in the prime of their respective careers.

What isn’t likely to be a product of coaching is the goaltending situation. It wasn’t all that good to start the season, and it hasn’t improved much. Johan Holmqvist lost the first three games (one in overtime) in this 18-game drought, then got shipped to Dallas. Enter Mike Smith. Since coming to Tampa from Dallas, Smith has performed well – 2.62, .900…almost Vezina-like, given what Tampa goaltending has looked like the last couple of years. But he’s been unlucky, too, managing only 3-7-0 record in ten games. Karri Ramo has the other five appearances, going 2-2-1, 2.78, .907.

Tampa Bay is a club that neither plays well with a lead (20^th in winning percentage when leading after one period, 28^th when leading after two), nor when trailing (28^th in winning percentage when trailing after one period, 30^th when trailing after two). As to the latter, the Lighting are 0-24-2 when trailing after two. The Caps are 1-25-2. If you have to catch an early flight on Friday morning, you might get a head-start on sleep just by noticing who is leading after 40 minutes.

This is a lot like the Atlanta game last Friday. The Caps are visiting a team they could, should, and must beat. But Tampa is dangerous enough with the likes of Lecavalier and St. Louis to make things difficult. And remember, it took a four-goal eruption by the Caps in the third period to overtake the Thrashers and win, 5-3.

It makes us want to ask…who will win this game?

Caps 5 – Lightning 2.

Frei-d Food...Adams Award Served Up

OK, there's a bad New York Post-like headline, but Terry Frei weighed in over at ESPN.com on who should be considered (as opposed to who will win) the Jack Adams Award as top coach for this season. It is an interesting look, with a case to be made for a number of coaches, including the Caps' own Bruce Boudreau, of whom Frei writes:

This is a triumph for the good guys who plug along as organization men and minor league coaches, wondering during the recycling process what the heck they have to do to get an NHL shot. Mostly a minor league journeyman player and then a minor league coach (including in the ECHL) for over a decade, Boudreau has paid more dues than a lifetime teamster at retirement.

As of this writing, the Capitals are 31-17-7 since Boudreau took over for Glen Hanlon on Nov. 22. A lot of that has to do with Alexander Ovechkin's ascension, but look around and note the talented players who aren't allowed enough freedom to be this electrifying. Boudreau has been the right man, in the right place, at the right time -- and that's a compliment. Even if the Caps fall short of making the playoffs, that doesn't diminish Boudreau's work.

There is something in there that has an unspoken quality to it, and that is the reference to Boudreau's getting a shot. Someone had to give him that shot, and that credit goes to George McPhee, who -- demeanor aside -- is quite the gambler of sorts. One might question the decision to give Glen Hanlon as much time as he was given at the start of the season, but the work he did in the two years after the lockout argued for giving him the chance to see what he could do with a more talented team than the one he had in those first two years.

However, once the decision was made to make a change behind the bench, the selection of that "organization man and minor league coach" was risky. A bad start to a season might have become a full implosion, had that decision been a poor one, with unthinkable lasting results for this franchise.

Heaven knows, Boudreau more than deserved a chance behind an NHL bench -- there was nothing more he could accomplish at the minor league level. But given the Caps having already tried a minor-league coach in the recent past -- with famously disastrous results -- picking this coach for this position didn't seem quite right (at least we didn't think so at the time).

But McPhee did, and the rest is a pleasant piece of Caps history that has yet to find it's closing line for this year.

Boudreau is worthy of Adams consideration, and given what he inherited, not to mention the lowly standing that pundits predicted for the Caps at the start of the season, he'd be a most deserving winner.

Taking one for the team...Dan Cleary

Consider the case of Red Wing forward Dan Cleary, who had three plates and over a dozen screws inserted into his jaw so that he could return to Detroit's line-up as soon as possible after having sufffered a broken jaw when he took a puck to the face in a game against Toronto on February 9th.

Cleary returned to action last night wearing a football-style helmet, picking up an assist (and a team-high five hits!) in 17 minutes of ice time as the Red Wings defeated St. Louis, 2-1.

..doff of the cap to James Mirtle for this one.

Standings that matter...

The records matter now only for what they mean in terms of the differences. It's time to think, "tie-breakers." Here is the tie-breaking formula...

1. The greater number of games won.

2. The greater number of points earned in games between the tied clubs. If two clubs are tied, and have not played an equal number of home games against each other, points earned in the first game played in the city that had the extra game shall not be included. If more than two clubs are tied, the higher percentage of available points earned in games among those clubs, and not including any "odd" games, shall be used to determine the standing.

3. The greater differential between goals for and against for the entire regular season.

Here is where the Caps stand on points and the three tie-breakers, relative to their own position:

In the event of a tie with any of the clubs in front of them, the Caps can win a tie-breaker only if they will have posted more wins, since they lose on head-to-head points-earned differential with each of those teams.

If the Caps come in on the short end of a three point game, it will have all the look of a loss. That is how fine the margin of error has become...there is none.

A TWO-point night: Caps 3 - Hurricanes 2 (OT/SO)

Excruciating, isn’t it?

Two…measly…points. That’s all that separated the Capitals and the playoffs when play began last night, and that is what still separated the Caps from the playoffs when play ended last night.

The Caps did their part to maintain the suspense in this last fortnight of the regular season with a 3-2 overtime shootout win over the Carolina Hurricanes.

As hockey games go, this would have been a decent enough contest had it been played in January. But with the added meaning such games take on now, it was a lot more. The three-point nature of the game probably means that the Hurricanes have all but clinched the Southeast Division. It would take something of a collapse by Carolina for the Caps to win the division, especially since the Hurricanes have clinched the season series (they have nine points earned to six for Washington, with one game remaining, and this is the second tie-breaker at season’s end).

Meanwhile, both Boston and Philadelphia maintained their margins over the Caps with wins. Side note…why has Daniel Briere decided now to earn his money? He has points in 11 of his last 12 games (8-6-14, +3), including a goal last night in a 2-1 overtime win against the Rangers in another three point game.

As for this one, the Hurricanes stole a point thanks to goalie Cam Ward, who stopped 42 of 44 shots, including all six in overtime when the Caps outshot the Hurricanes 6-0.

If Ward played well, his counterpart – Crisotbal Huet – deserved better…much better. Huet “allowed,” if that word can be used, two goals. Both were odd, to say the least. On the first, Joe Corvo held the puck at the top of the Caps’ zone on a power play, faking a slap shot. He moved the puck to Jeff Hamilton, who was proceeded to pass to Eric Cole for what appeared to be a one timer from the right point. The puck never got to Cole. It pinballed off of the skate of Boyd Gordon, and with Huet already moving across the crease in anticipation of the shot from Cole, the puck slid quietly into the Caps’ net.

The other goal came on the infrequent occurrence of an overturned referee’s call. Eric Cole stepped out from behind the net to Huet’s right with the puck on his backhand. Shaone Morrisonn tried to tie up Cole, and the two tumbled into Huet in the crease. Three bodies and a puck were tangled at the goal line, and the referee blew the play dead, signaling no goal.

After further review…

…and some more review…

…and some more review…

…the call was overturned and the goal awarded. You could make an argument that Huet stopped all the “shots” he faced, deflections off a teammate from 40 feet away and goal-line scrums notwithstanding. It was a superb effort on his part in a hostile arena against a team looking to make a point and stick a dagger in the Caps’ playoff hopes.

Almost lost in this was the fact that Alex Ovechkin set a franchise record for goals in a season with his 61st off a nifty feed from Nicklas Backstrom. The goal put Ovechkin into a tie for 29th in the all-time top goal-scoring season rankings (with Mike Bossy, Reggie Leach, and Phil Esposito). Just as amazing, Ovechkin racked up a whopping 27:07 in ice time (second to Mike Green’s 31:17). He also led the team in hits with four. Guess the team is going to climb on his back for a ride to (hopefully) the playoffs.

With two assists, Nicklas Backstrom regained the scoring lead among rookies, pulling one point ahead of Chicago’s Patrick Kane. And he’s closing with a rush, too. Backstrom, in his last 15 games, is 5-12-17, +14. That last number is not a misprint, and the points pace works out to an 82-game pace of 27-66-93. He’s a keeper.

Think the Hurricanes didn’t miss Rod Brind’Amour? 15-15, 8-15, 0-3, 5-7. Those were the face off wins and losses for Eric Staal, Trevor Letowski, Scott Walker, and Keith Aucoin. Overall, Carolina was 29-42 (40.8 percent) in the circle.

Four. We thought that holding the Hurricanes under five power play chances was important. The Caps held the Hurricanes to four chances, although both Carolina goals were scored, so to speak, with the man-advantage. When the Hurricanes pounded the Caps 5-0 and 6-3 in previous games in Raleigh, they were 7-for-14. They had the same success rate (50 percent), but fewer chances.

Viktor Kozlov, with the winner coming in the gimmick phase of the contest, is 3-for-7 in such situations. So is Alexander Semin. Think that doesn’t mean anything? The Caps’ top gimmick performers last year were Semin and Ovechkin, both with two goals (on 10 and 12 shots, respectively). The Caps also were 1-11. This year, 4-4.

Eric Staal had a point – an assist on the Hamilton ricochet. That’s not bad, but this was a guy who had multiple point games in six of his last nine contests coming into last night’s game. Getting him off for four minutes on two minor penalties wasn’t bad, either. OK, less than four minutes, since the Caps scored when he was off on his first minor.

Playing Twister with numbers…Alex Ovechkin had 11 shots in 27:07 of ice time. That works out to a shot every 2:28. Donald Brashear had two shots in 6:45…a shot every 3:23. That was the second most frequent shooting pace on the team last night…puck hog.

More Twister with numbers…Alex Ovechkin has taken 421 shots in 1,648 shifts, about one shot every four shifts (doesn’t sound like that much when you say it like that, Peerless). He has 61 goals in those shifts…about one in every 27. Goes to show, even as prolific as Ovechkin is, goals are special things.

Know who’s due for a breakout game?...Mike Green. He’s gone a dozen games without a goal, his longest stretch of the year. He’s not lacking for being aggressive in ending that slide…nine shot attempts last night, nine last Friday against Atlanta, four against Chicago, four against Nashville, eight against Boston…you get the idea. Sooner or later…

And speaking of the defense, the six blueliners who dressed last night deserve a hand. Two fluky goals against a team that has given the Caps so much trouble this year is a fine night by any standard.

We’re down to five games with a couple of land mines immediately ahead. The Caps are 6-5-1 against Tampa Bay and Florida, 3-3-0 in their trips to the Sunshine State. The Caps can’t do anything about Boston, Philadelphia, or the price of gas. All they can do is tend to their own business by winning. Do that, and things will take care of themselves.