My good friend Eric McErlain didn't pick a good night to play hookie from the hockey rink. But he doesn't have much red in his wardrobe anyway.

But first thing's first. I asked for one WaPost columnist to attend Tuesday night and George Solomon sent two, including himself. There were enough Post reporters in attendance last night to fairly fill the media elevator. I messaged Dan Steinberg after the game, explaining to him my need now to call out the Post for 'dissing the Wizards and Redskins in its Caps' slant. Hah.

(Reader Dave: did you really deliver my letter to the Post yesterday?)

Every Caps' player in the post game commented on the home crowd. The Caps Tuesday night established their bona fides as an aspiring playoff team to be reckoned with; their supporters in the stands likewise auditioned magnificently for the role of postseason noisemakers of distinction. Both are new to the endeavor -- both seem very ready.

Those of us in the hockey blogging community wondered what would happen to our privileged perch in the Verizon Center press box when our sweet secret about this hockey team got out, and a tsunami of bandwagoning old media came a calling. Tuesday night, we learned. To accommodate all of the press demand for the big game the Caps' media maven Nate Ewell filled every press box seat, two rows deep, on both sides of the sixth floor, and managed to fulfill every media request he fielded, new and old. That impressed me. I'm not going to suggest that should the team make a deep run in the playoffs we in new media will all be there to cover it . . . just maybe reminding Mr. Leonsis of his pledge to 'Hockey Night in Canada' to host us in his box should press credentials run short. Hah.

Wow but it was red in the rink. During the national anthem, with the lights dimmed, the three levels of red managed to cast a powerfully pervasive haze of hometown unity. Mr. Leonsis was beaming in the post-game locker room adorned in his red Caps' sweater. Channel 4's Lindsay Czarniak looked fetching in a stylish red sweater. ("Fetching"? That's awful writing. The woman could fill a cathedral of male worshippers wearing a potato sack and mud mask.) Lisa Hillary was red literally from neckline to toe -- eager to show off a new red paint job on her toes. Sportscasters Michael Jenkins and Dave Feldman brought their naturally red hair. I wore a smart looking red necktie.

You know who looked reddest of all? Peter Laviolette.

Our good friends from the Hershey Bears sure picked the right night for a visit. John Walton was blogging in-game and delightfully distracted from all those Bears' injuries by the electric atmosphere in the rink. Tim Leone of the Patriot News was sharing with me his anticipation for next week's Frozen Four, with the upstart, Cinderella Fighting Irish of Notre Dame having captured his former USC Trojan heart. Chris Poisal summed up the feelings of all from the farm: he came away impressed with this hockey team's "swagger." He told me during the second intermission that what he was seeing out on the ice Tuesday night reminded him a lot of the swagger the Hershey Bears had en route to their Calder Cup in 2006.

"This team is going to make the playoffs," Poisal told me, "and once there, they are going to do damage."

The game atmospheres feverish hockey fans fantastically improve correspond intimately to the magic their eyes consume. This new Red Army in town seemed Tuesday night unleashed as a fixture battalion on F Street. At times Tuesday, most especially when the home team delivered a glass-rattling check, they ascended to alarming realms of raucousness: with clenched fists they'd turn and pound on the glass partition separating them from the game's media. It was, initially, somewhat scary -- but scary good.

Chalk it up to excessive Red Hook.

Thursday night -- and thirty months from now -- I can envision the earth-toned-clad hockey fan arriving at the Phone Booth to looks of disdain from his impassioned puck peer in scarlet. Even Gang Green has gone red.

Let's designate this Wednesday -- mercifully for our panic-attack hockeyhearts a gameless day for the home team -- a Code Red: meaning, ours is the team and sport white-hot in town, we its supporters now send screams of "Let's Go Caps!" cascading through Metro tunnels and Green Turtles. Let's bask in this red glow of victory all day and evening long, get dinner out of the way early and settle in before the TVs for a fresh set of Eastern conference showdowns. And even in our temporary, domestic R&R, dress for battle.