… well, aside from a 4-3 loss in a game that the Capitals for the most part dominated:
- Sean Avery. In particular, how did the referees not call Interference when Avery repeatedly pushed Mike Green back into the Rangers’ bench? Clearly a penalty.
- The non-call (Interference, again) when Fleischmann was taken down in the Rangers’ zone, leading to a break the other way that produced a Rangers goal.
- Jeff Schultz apparently tripping over the faceoff circle, leading to the GWG. ‘Nuff said.
- Walking to the Metro after the game and seeing a kid wearing a Rangers Jagr jersey. Double-whammy there… bad enough that The Jagr Experiment went horribly awry, but the fact that the Caps paid for a third of Jagr’s goals while he was a Ranger… ouch.
Lest you think I’m a pessimist, there was plenty of goodness in last night’s game:
- Viktor Kozlov scored his first goal in 22 playoff appearances.
- Alex Ovechkin played his usual brilliant game.
- Matt Bradley brought the pain via a few crushing hits — and others (e.g., Mike Green, Kozlov, and more) also laid out a few Rangers.
- The PP went 2-for-7, which against the #1 ranked Rangers PK isn’t half bad — that’s the first time in 30 games the Rags have allowed more than one PPG.
- The Capitals absolutely ruled the faceoff, winning about 70% of the draws (46/66).
But a loss is a loss. One would think that Coach Boudreau will work the team hard the next couple days… because the Caps are already facing a must-win situation Saturday afternoon.
19 Comments
That’s okay, Green made up for his being pushed into the bench by kicking Avery in the head and cutting his ear.
Good post, I look forward to coming back and checking out some more!
Jason
I look forward to coming back and reading more sour grapes. Funny you forgot to mention the very weak calls on 2 of the first 3 Washington power plays. Ovechin was amazing, the Caps threw several BIG bodies checks, but outstanding goaltending wins.
I would agree with some of the non-calls, but the worst thing I saw last night was the goal tending. C’mon Theo needs to be our last line of defense and last night he certainly appeared to be anything but prepared. The Caps outplayed the Rangers in every way, except for goal tending. Doesn’t matter how great Alex is if there’s nothing to stop the puck from getting in the net.
Just saw the replays.
-@ the Gomez goal: While I didn’t expect the refs to call interference on Avery’s pick on Green, they should’ve called interference on Antropov. No way was Fleischmann near the puck.
-@ the Antropov goal: No penalty killers stepped up to challenge Antropov. He had a lot of room to operate, and he made it look pretty.
-@ the Nasund goal: This might’ve been prevented if one of the penalty killers had hounded Gomez instead of going to the bench for a change. You can’t give a skater room to reset unless the puck is all the way at their end. Gomez was able to reset from the red line without much harassment, the oncoming penalty killers were too late to prevent anything from happening.
-@ the Dubinsky goal: Schultz definitely should’ve hit Dubinsky. He had ample support on the backside to prevent an alternative 2-on-1 from occuring and Kozlov (covering one the closest trailer) would’ve been able to turn to retrieve the loose puck and chip it out. If that was Pothier or Alzner or Poti in that spot, maybe the same thing happens. If it’s Jurcina or Erskine (or even Green based on last night’s hitting) there, Dubinsky would’ve been stuck to the glass.
If it was Joe Finley there, Dubinsky’s out for the rest of the playoffs.
Except for the Gomez goal, the Caps were defensively inept in front of their goaltender. That has to change if they want to get past the first round.
Re: Theo, I agree with PureAgression’s assessment: it’s more a problem with defense than goaltending. Unlike Lundqvist, Theodore isn’t going to steal many (if any) games; but it’s the D that owns last night’s loss.
Good article. But, while you are complaining about the non-calls against NY how about you also realize that the Caps got several calls that went their way that shouldn’t have been. I know the 1st penalty 18 seconds into the game was an absolute joke. Then that play where Avery skated right over Erskine, he got his arms up and deserved a penalty but Erskine was 100% guilty of interference on the play and at least one of the 3 minors that Naslund took were ridiculous.
Just be happy that the way that the NHL is calling plays nowadays that the good clean hits by Morrisone & Green weren’t called. In any given day in the NHL those plays could have resulted in no call, a minor for elbowing or a 5 minute major. NHL officiating is a joke & so inconsistent.
It’s a long series, hopefully NY can get another win Saturday!
merrr…
i dunno, our defense has rested on the laurels that our potent offense has provided them for the vast majority of the season (never a good thing), but my assumption at this point is that jose is used to that by now. my thoughts (while perhaps slightly unfair) are that theo IS the last line of defense. it’s his job to stop at least 90% of the pucks that get past the defensemen, and while his game wasn’t awful (just pretty inept), i noticed two things about every puck that slipped by him into the cage:
* total dear in headlights look. he didn’t move for any of those goals…except maybe one
*a couple of those goals were pretty ordinary shots…where’s vezina theo?!
by the way- THE RANGERS CRASH THE CREASE FOR THEIR GOALS. NOT ONLY DO THEY DO IT, BUT THEY MAKE IT LOOK EASY. i hope i wasn’t the only one (*cough* entire caps offense *cough cough*) who noticed that when the caps crashed the net, they were able to capitalize a lot quicker than when their shots were made from the points
Refs were awful. I mean did you see that offsides call on the far side that was nowhere close to crossing completely over the line (in fact it barely even poked out of the line) with the linesman looking right at it unobstructed from five FEET away? Terrible. What is this yokel doing on the ice? Sure the Caps scored on the very next play but it’s the principle of the thing!
Let’s face it. The Caps BLEW IT by not picking up a quality defenseman in the trade deadline. What was McPhee THINKING? Does he not see the difference between regular season and postseason hockey, and that our goaltending and penalty killing are the weakest links? I’m flabbergasted.
Hm. Maybe you couldn’t see it from the press box. But the worst thing I saw were a bunch of Rangers fans getting kicked out of Section 413, and a very small child (about 2yo) being held by her father with a frightened expression on her face nearby. I have no idea what those guys were doing, but scaring little children is unacceptable behavior.
I agree, there was plenty to complain about the refereeing of this game. But I felt like the defense was a little weaker than it could have been. I’ve seen the Caps play a lot better and I think they still have potential to win.
All I could say when I saw the scratches last night were “I’d rather have Pothier than Schultz”! I echoed those words when Schultz tripped over his own feet in the third.
Also, from where I was sitting it looked like most of the Rags goals were scored far side (across the body) top shelf, picking the corners…aka – the perfect shot.
One last thing. I was impressed with the Rags PK last night. They kept at least one player wide covering Ovie’s one timer. If Ovie is going to have success on the PP, I think he is going to have to crank one or two one timers early then start faking the shot later one and skating a few strides with the puck before firing it on net, changing the angles. We need more traffic in front of their net!!!
I am not to worried about the noncalls. Thats refereeing. It evens out over a series.
We have one problem… and its a big one.
Our “D” is an essential part of our offensive attack. It makes us vulnerable to the odd man rush by the opposition on turnovers in our own end when the defense is on offense.
When the opposition’s goalie is huge and we give up goals we shouldn’t, either poor play by the defense or soft goals by the goalie, we are toast.
That is what we should be worrying about.
Don’t get me wrong, I love Boudreau’s system but we have to be able to make the big play on defense. He will tell you that.
We can’t win against a very good goalie if we continue to give up marginal goals.
Theo and the rest of our so-called defense were a nightmare. You can’t win with a less than mediocre defense and a terrible goalie. Having a stellar goalie is the only thing that saved us for so many years. Since there’s no way that our defensemen are going to simultaneously become world-class in two days’ time, Theo is just going to have to suck it up and become great.
First of all I agree with everyone that says our D and our goalie is in need of some major help….Secondly, crash the net!!!! Seriously they’ve been told that all season and whenever someone is in front of the net it works out for us!!!!
Buck up, Caps fans, we barely lost this game when we overall played a decent game (snow-snakes not withstanding). We’ve known all season that we should be nervous when scoring 3 or fewer goals. Would a 4-3 outcome for the Capitals have seemed all that inplausible given the action last night?
Did anyone see that 1st period? That alone should give everyone reason to stay optimistic. Blueshirts were being plastered all over the place and I’d LOVE to see the zone-time stats. We played most of the 1st in their end and just couldn’t crack the net. Felt a LOT like that 7-1 loss in Philly where we pelted them with 25 shots in the 1st period and came up empty.
Mike Green forgot how to shoot in the 3rd period’s power plays, did anyone else notice that? I know the Rags were trying like hell to clog up his shooting lanes, but I still found myself BEGGING him to let ‘em loose and save us like he did in game 1 vs. the Flyers last postseason.
The postgame radio guys nailed it, Backstrom was awesome. I still think we’ll win this series but it may now take 7 to do so. Nothing worth having comes easy, also good prep for our 2nd round opponent.
Schultz out, Pothier in. Nothing at all personal, but I hope that’s the last time I see ‘Forrest’ in a Caps sweater.
Capitals in 5!!!
One thing I’ll say that pissed me off – Throwing crap onto the ice when the game was over.
IDIOTS. They should be banned from the VC. If its not a hat, they should go.
Sean Avery is a punk. But I would love it if he were wearing our colors.
No doubt the officiating seemed a bit one-sided last night, but I think the refs have a hard time shifting gears from the regular season to the playoffs. There is a big difference how games are officiated once April comes around.
Hit is up at The Bossanova.
Reignite hatred? If you were a fan of the CAPS from anywhere in the early 80’s on, there is nothing but absolute hatred for all of the former Patrick divisioners, spare none, Rangers included. Outplaying them is admirable, but you have to light the lamp in the playoffs, that is in particular why many foes of old beat us with questionable defense and netminding.
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