Q: What do you get when you have over 11 minutes of power play time?
A: 5 shots and no goals, if you’re the Capitals in Calgary.
The Caps’ poor power play continued tonight in their loss to the Flames; apparently the Capitals were as sleepy as their fans due to the late-for-east-coasters start. Yes, the officials’ calls were odd (to put it charitably) but the Capitals had ample opportunity to blow the game open early. Both teams’ netminders played well, but it was mainly a similarly weak PP effort by the Flames that kept the final score close.
The power play squads’ inexplicable insistence on “pretty goals” continues to stymie Coach Boudreau more than their opponents. When everyone from coach to announcers to hoarse-voiced fans are begging the PP to shoot the puck… well, perhaps it’s time to give that innovative strategy a try.
But just because most of the team skated as if through mud (can’t blame the Verizon Center’s ice tonight, eh?), a few Capitals deserve kudos. Therefore we present the Capitals’ Three Stars:
- Sergei Fedorov: The Capitals’ only goal scorer gave his usual hard-fought effort throughout the game. He even made a terrific 2-on-1 save with an empty net behind him as time wound down, providing the team a chance for one more 6-on-5 offensive rush.
- Jose Theodore: Locker judged it “his best game as a Cap” and I agree. He looked looser and more confident, and made some pretty saves (that were unfortunately matched by Kipper at the other end).
- Tyler Sloan: He played hard for his 9 minutes of ice time, and acquitted himself well in his first-ever NHL game. More importantly, he gets a star for his stellar hit in the first period that turned out to be the most exciting moment of the game.However Sloan’s hockey career unfolds, he just became a trivia gem as the first Capital ever to wear #89 in a regular season or playoff game.
Another bonus of Sloan’s hit was that it yielded nine minutes of retaliatory penalties… that the Caps squandered. Oops, the negativity crept back in, apologies. Why don’t we, and the Capitals, move on to the next game, one where hopefully 5-on-5 play will total more than 32 minutes, and the Caps’ PP crashes the net and *gasp* shoots… the… puck!
6 Comments
Its 845am eastern time on WEDNESDAY….I think the Caps were just called for another minor penalty.
Heh… so THAT’s why I thought I just heard a whistle. Thanks for the update Sparty.
The officiating was awful last night. But when the Caps didn’t score after the refs hit Rene Bourqe with that 19-minute smack-down (including the misconduct) — as Ovechkin himself said, “It was the first time I’ve ever had a nine-minute power-play and we had only one chance in those nine minutes and it can’t be like that” — you knew it was coming.
What an annoying and frustrating game!
What I got out of it: I learned that you can’t toss your stick to your goalie if he loses his. Who knew?
@ joyfulleigh18: My guess? 99.9% of NHLers.
Was I mistaken or did they allow Bourque back on the ice at the end of the 9 minutes of PP and not at the end of the 10 minute misconduct?
Squandered oppourtunities and too many stoooooopid penalties about sums that effort up. Hope BB skates them hard today, and maybe cuts skating time of a couple (since we can’t bench anybody at this point) to maybe get them back on track.
Theo had a good game for once (although the first goal was a result of poor rebound control), and hopefully the chemistry is starting to work.
Tomorrows a new game in a long schedule.
Granted the Caps PP was dismal, but I thought is was one of the sloppiest performance by a team since Kolzig’s last start in Chicago last year.
Misguided and ill-timed passes killed them. They have an excellent/fast transition, but even speed requires patience.
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