Sobald klar, wurden hoch-def-in-digitale Spielbilder der neuen Gewinde auf Linie veröffentlicht, Lob für die Umarbeitung waren weitverbreitet. The team modernized its on-ice look, but not lavishly or outlandishly or, most importantly, faddishly, and there were clear but subtle acknowledgements back to the original threads. It was a look that appeared to be the best of the old blended with a hip new.

More fans wearing more of the new color and look became apparent at Verizon Center after the end-of-the-year holidays in 2007, and as the team turned its season around by late winter in 2008, even more of the red, white and blue filled the home rink. The new look was fast becoming a smash hit.

When the stretch-run became white-red-hot, so too did the look of the nation’s capital. The team declared “Red Outs” for the final week of regular season play, and the fans responded fanatically. The uni-color solidarity within the Phone Booth continued into the postseason. Comcast’s Lisa Hillary told me during one home postseason game that Verizon Center looked distinctly like Calgary’s Red Mile of playoffs past.

Planned or unplanned, the team’s return to its original colors has afforded an opportunity to market the old with the new. On my visit to the Kettler shop Saturday I saw rack after rack of red, but the names and numbers on the t-shirts were both old and new. Semin, Clark, and Ovechkin were joined by Hunter and Langway. My father, who wore his red senior’s hockey sweater to two postseason home games, will later this week be receiving an old-school, old-logo-ed red t-shirt bearing Rod Langway’s nameplate and number on its back, along with instructions to wear it both while mowing his massive yard and barbequing for Saturday night houseguests. He loved Langway.

I have plans for some heavy-duty recreating this summer. I’ll be sweating a lot in red.

Saturday was gorgeous in D.C., and the moreso to be navigating the route back from Kettler-Capitals toward Maryland on the GW Parkway. The first Saturday of being eliminated from hockey’s postseason is always a painful one for me, but under that Chamber of Commerce sky Saturday, with my sack of red as companion, I felt immense pride instead of pain, and I began thinking about Washington’s hockey hardcore as well as the new converts this spring showcasing their pride in the hockey team this offseason. There is so much to be proud of.

Our Army should be arriving at neighborhood pools this offseason covered up in red. Yard work should be conducted in a ‘Rock the Red’ tee. Jogging, rollerblading, dog walking — all of it should be completed while identified as Ovie, Olie, Huntsy, or Langway. We should attend rock concerts at Nissan and Merriweather and Rock the Red there as well.

Let’s Red-out the region this summer. The Washington Post is watching.

Filed in Alexander Ovechkin, Alexander Semin, Chris Clark, Hardcore Hockey Fans, Hockey Rituals, Kettler Capitals Iceplex, Lisa Hillary, Media, Olaf Kolzig, Print, Stanley Cup Playoffs, Washington Capitals, Washington Post, Washington the Hockey Town| Permalink| Comments (3)

An Exhortation for the Red Nation

By pucksandbooks
Thursday, April 17, 2008

This morning we are dispensing with all that is dour and dire. Where yesterday we saw disappointment and despair, today we see possibility and promise.

(I drank very good wine last night.)

Per Tarik, these are tonight’s lines for our warriors:

Ovechkin-Fedorov-Kozlov
Laich-Backstrom-Semin
Cooke-Steckel-Bradley
Brashear-Gordon-Fehr

We would do well to remind ourselves of the mortality of our foe. It wasn’t all that long ago that the Flyers lost 10 games in a row. In the vernacular of the wine connoisseur, that’s Sutter Home stinky.

You will note, too, that neither Frozen Fours nor Popes seem much inclined to visit the metropolis that is home to our adversary.

They sip on Yuengling — what good can come from a $2 bottle? We in the seat of power summon the world’s finest samplings of lagers, pilsners, and ales, and have them poured from taps in our town’s every tavern.

These nuissances to the north, they are hardened, and how couldn’t they be — their city is home to women who look like this:

Our city, however, is home to puck princesses:

Today we rally. Tonight our Young Guns get unholstered and go high caliber. The Broad Street billionaires are living in the past, their rink’s video screens and belligerent supporters in orange rallying around nostalgia. Holmgren. Berube. Stevens. They have billboards rising high in the city skyline paying homage to their non-scoring knuckleheads. Theirs is a flickering fancy of fisticuffs. The rest of hockey has grown up.

Bullies can be skilled to death.

We are merely at the dawn of the Era of Ovechkin. His is a sun that alights a sport at once across all time zones, and recent clouds about him today will part. I look outside upon Washington this morning of game 4 and I see his brilliant shine.

Filed in Lisa Hillary, National Hockey League, Philadelphia Flyers, Stanley Cup Playoffs, Washington Capitals| Permalink| Comments (28)

We Look Like Postseason Calgary

By pucksandbooks
Saturday, April 5, 2008

If you saw Calgary Flames’ playoff games when “Red Outs” were declared, that’s what Verizon Center looks like tonight.

All three levels.

Comcast’s Lisa Hillary spent part of her broadcasting career in Calgary.

“This looks just like Calgary’s ‘Red Mile’,” she told me.

Filed in Calgary Flames, Lisa Hillary, National Hockey League, Stanley Cup Playoffs, Washington Capitals, Western Conference| Permalink| Comments (0)

All Caps on WaPo Live

By Gustafsson
Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Ready the DVRs (does anyone use a VCR anymore?) for Comcast SportsNet at 5pm on Thursday. ‘Washington Post Live’ is leaving the studio for a day and taking the whole show to the concourse of Verizon Center for a full slate of Caps’ talk.

Dmitry Chesnokov of Sovetsky Sport, and good friend of OFB, is booked for the show. Naturally, Dmitry is closer to certain members of the team than other reporters, and his insight is always welcomed.  Other confirmed guests include Lisa Hillary, Craig Laughlin, former radio play-by-play voice Ron Weber, Tarik El-Bashir, Steve Kolbe, and Mike Vogel.  Additionally, either Bruce Boudreau or George McPhee will be on to start the show.

WaPo Live often takes email questions on the air so fire them off to wpl@comcastsportsnet.tv.  If you miss the live broadcast at 5pm, there is a rebroadcast at 1:30am.

Filed in Bruce Boudreau, Comcast SportsNet, George McPhee, Lisa Hillary, Sovetsky Sport, Tarik El-Bashir, Washington Capitals, Washington Post| Permalink| Comments (0)

The Color of Success

By pucksandbooks
Wednesday, April 2, 2008

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.

Filed in 2 Points, American Hockey League, Blogs, Carolina Hurricanes, Comcast SportsNet, Dan Steinberg, Hershey Bears, Hockey Night in Canada, Internet, John Walton, Lindsay Czarniak, Lisa Hillary, Media, Morning cup-a-joe, Print, Stanley Cup Playoffs, TV, Tarik El-Bashir, WRC, Washington Capitals, Washington Post| Permalink| Comments (11)

A Re-oriented Media Trumpets a Region-Wide Reconsideration of ‘That Other Sport’

By pucksandbooks
Thursday, March 27, 2008

Pardon the Interruption from your regularly scheduled March madness, and Skins’ weight room Cam, for local broadcast media’s maiden voyage on a Love Boat cruise with a lover named hockey. Comcast SportsNet is done giving hockey the back of its hand; it isn’t having any more of its past puck indifference. Today, it’s smitten with our 60-goal sniper and his team’s Rudy-like rise. This spring, the region’s television sports outlet is experiencing a Man-crush on Ovie, is infatuated with the Caps, and is stalking the sport of hockey.

Wednesday night, Comcast, in due consideration of the Eastern conference playoff implications, aired the Chicago-Columbus game live. There were no games in the East, so it went West.

Next, we shall conquer 15th St.!

(Made by bloggers movie title: Invasion of the Hockey-Hating-Body Snatchers) (starring Lisa Hillary)

Approximately 15 minutes before Tuesday night’s puck-drop in Carolina, near the end of a 30-minute ‘Sportsnight’ that easily could have been mistaken for the NHL Network’s ‘On the Fly’ (were its content Caps-exclusive), the studio tandem of Jill Sorenson and Chick Hernandez stood out away from their normal anchor’s desk perch, looked straight into the cameras, and exhorted Washington’s sports fans to get out to Verizon Center during this hockey renaissance spring and check out “our region’s Tiger Woods.”

I’d never heard Ovie compared to Tiger before in the press in these parts. The more I thought about it Tuesday night and since, the more I became of the opinion that the Comcast broadcasters were spot on. Adding credence to their claim was the in-kind sentiment articulated by team owner Leonsis in one of the six or seven or eleven Caps’ segments produced by Lisa Hillary and aired during the half-hour lead-in to the ‘Canes’ game.

There were features with unhurried interview snippets of George McPhee, Bruce Boudreau, Ted, Ovie of course, and even Jarome Iginla from the Flames’ visit to town earlier this season. Later, Owen Nolan was asked for his thoughts on the Gr8. Raise your hand if back in September you thought you’d come here to learn of Owen Nolan being interviewed on ‘Sportsnight’ in March.

Even if the Caps fail to make it to the postseason at least early in April we’ll be able to tune in to Comcast footage of Hillary strolling the cherry blossoming Tidal Basin in the company of Gordie Howe.

Ovie, you may have seen here earlier this week, joked with Russian media recently that he was even well known by our current President. I’m not sure we’ll have that as a hypothetical much longer, for I’m convinced that Hillary will attend the next White House presser with the Prez and solicit his thoughts on 60 goals in a single season.

My favorite moment from Tuesday night — moreso even than Viktor Kozlov’s game-deciding shootout tally — was when Hillary in the pre-game alerted viewers to her needing to race off the Comcast set and get home pronto to catch the game. This was no baseless aside of a bone to Caps’ fans — seconds later you could actually hear her scampering off the set and a somewhat stunned Chick Hernandez confirm the departure.

Canadians are so cultured. Think about it — who’s the Canadian equivalent of Britney Spears?

My second-favorite moment from Tuesday was a post-game telephone call I received from one of my post-game puck “regulars.” From this chum, known to stress over preseason forward line combinations, I expected a few hosannahs of relief before receiving a breakdown of the formidable task awaiting the team in Tampa. Instead, my friend opened with, “Did you see Comcast before the game?” My friend was euphoric, and only partly due to the game’s outcome.

Then she said of the pre-game coverage, in perfect seriousness, “I was very close to tears.”

The main reason I monitor media in this sport in these parts is because of reactions like that. It has less to do with fans’ sense of coverage entitlement and far more with their looking at a television screen and seeing their souls serenaded.

Wednesday morning I tuned in to Comcast’s ‘Sportsrise’ right at 7:00. There’s a sparkling new baseball stadium debuting here this week, the playoff-bound Wizards played Tuesday night, and the Lady Terps advanced to the women’s Sweet Sixteen a few hours earlier. “But first up,” the morning anchor announced, “The Caps were in Carolina to take on the Hurricanes.”

This offseason I have plans to explore here my notion of how preposterous it is to view sports journalism in the same prism we do with “hard” or “serious” news coverage. Hockey beat reporters comporting themselves with unyielding “detachment” from the athletes they cover and the fans who fervently follow? To what end? What is the virtue — now especially, in an age of advocacy journalism, but even years back — of Edward R. Murrowing the Sacramento Kings’ or Florida Panthers’ beat?

Anyway, here and now, we who make up HockeyWashington are being feted in town at a lavish media feast, whereas mere months ago we dined outside on stripped bones with the dogs. We have still a few empty chairs at our banquet table.

Where are the Washington Post sports columnists?

Filed in Alexander Ovechkin, Comcast SportsNet, Jill Sorenson, Lisa Hillary, Media, Morning cup-a-joe, TV, Washington Capitals, Washington Post| Permalink| Comments (9)

Inside the Roots of Hockey: Comcast Chronicles the Capitals on the Road with Dad

By pucksandbooks
Tuesday, March 11, 2008

comcastsportsnet.jpgMost especially in Canada, “hockey is absolutely central and integral to lives of boys and their dads, and much of what happens between them begins to unfold the very first time a young father leads his little one out onto the ice,” we learn in Roy MacGregor’s The Home Team: Fathers, Sons & Hockey. “Hockey is the vehicle through that complex relationship, and it is also the expression of that relationship.”

Leave it then to a Canadian on the hockey beat here in town, Comcast Sportsnet’s Lisa Hillary, to recognize a great story in the Capitals’ hosting 15 fathers of team members on a three-game roadtrip last month. Hillary accompanied the team and the dads on a unique, 4-day trip that many of the players called “an opportunity to give back.” The result is a three-part series, “Fathers, Mentors, and Friends,” that debuts this Wednesday, March 12, during ‘Sportsnite’ at 6:00. It documents Caps’ dads as “driving” forces, sacrificing catalysts, understandably proud parents, and best friends.

“Thanks Dad for all the 5:00 a.m. drives to the rink when I was a kid — I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you,” one Capitals’ player said on the trip.

If you viewed on TV any of the three games the Caps played in Atlanta, Miami, and Tampa Bay on the trip last month, you were certain to see Comcast cameras pan in on the dads all seated together each night — all of them wearing the sweaters of their sons. Hillary’s series details the interactions and events that occurred between games and at the end of the trip. Cameras followed the dads and their NHL sons on airplanes, in locker rooms, even into the Florida Everglades and a dangerous encounter with an alligator.

“Watching your own child on the ice surface in a country where one game matters above all else is a torturous, rapturous experience,” MacGregor observes in his book. Thanks to Lisa Hillary and Comcast, this week in Washington we’ll get to share in the rapture: a healthy dose of big-leaguers expressing big-time gratitude to their dads.

“Fathers, Mentors and Friends,” on Comcast Sportsnet’s ‘Sportsnite’: March 12, 6:00 p.m. — Part I; March 14, 6:00 p.m. — Part II; March 18, 6:00 p.m. — Part III

Filed in Comcast SportsNet, Lisa Hillary, Media, Washington Capitals| Permalink| Comments (4)

Knee-Jerks & Notes: Caps-Habs, 1/31

By DC Sports Chick
Friday, February 1, 2008

Montreal Logo - image from TSN.caKnee-Jerk ReactionsThe Caps met Montreal for the second time in three nights. Given that the early headline on NHL.com was “Habs Go for Home-and-Home Sweep,” the Caps had something to prove Thursday night. They also were seeking to avoid consecutive losses in regulation under Bruce Boudreau.

Good crowd, good ice, two streaking teams, and a crammed press box.

  • The game started off with a high-stick hello — apparently the Canadiens thought they’d need to smack Ovechkin in the face with a stick in order to send a message. The only thing louder than the outrage on that hit was, lamentably, the “O” during the anthem.
  • Great stuff attempt on that first power play by Laich. If only it went in.
  • The RDS feed was on in front of us (pucksandbooks is yapping away with all his Hershey buddies in the house while I do the game work), and it appeared that Brashear went to the box for “rudesse,” which apparently means “roughing” in Habs-speak. We’ve seen worse infractions during a Metro ride. Especially this season.
  • It was Hershey night at the Phone Booth (Josef Boumedienne and Sami Lepisto were signing autographs before the game, then watched the game from the press box), and even Coco arrived to help Slapshot with mascot duties.
  • What a slapper by Ovechkin! Any harder and that would’ve taken Huet’s head off.
  • Season ticket holder Pat Sajak is in the house. Although he didn’t look too enthused at being highlighted in the center ice scoreboard. What we wouldn’t give for his seats…a ceramic dalmation, perhaps?
  • Thank you, lack of Montreal defense, for Ovechkin’s second goal of the night. Too bad that was immediately followed up with Montreal’s first goal of the game.
  • Quintin Laing is an absolute workhorse out there, despite a lack of ice time in this game (six minutes in the first two periods). But we already knew that.

Hershey Bears Logo

  • Montreal is getting a team back in the QMJHL next season, after a five-year absence. The St. John’s Fog Devils have been sold to a Montreal businessman. Speaking of the Q league, Capitals’ prospect Mathieu Perreault is on a 20-game scoring streak!
  • Courtesy of the Caps Cribs segment: Quintin Laing and his wife have the cutest little boy, who sleeps in the closet in their apartment. As Laing explains, “It’s a very big closet.”
  • There are three Russian journalists in the press box tonight. The game’s first five goals scored were by Russian players, so the journalists were understandably beaming.
  • Ladies, get out the stilettos — Hockey ‘n Heels is coming back in February! (Note: wearing heels is optional, and probably not a good idea if they do the on-ice shot tutorial again.)
  • Brashear has had an impact on the ice tonight — and several Montreal players have felt that impact.
  • And the hits just keep on coming! What a physical game this is — no shortage of glass-shaking or open-ice collisions tonight.
  • Ovechkin’s first hat trick at home: through the defender’s legs, up over Huet’s left shoulder, into the cage at about 170 mph, and back out the cage almost to the blueline. He sure enjoys playing against Montreal. No wonder their press was begging him to sign there.
  • Guillaume Latendresse broke up all the Russian goal-scoring with the Habs’ third goal.
  • The lack of a whistle leading to Montreal’s fourth goal is sure to be a hot topic during this game’s post-mortem.
  • There are hat tricks and then there’s what Ovie accomplished Thursday night: a four-goal, bash ‘em and blur-by-’em “one for the ages” (that’s Mike Vogel’s post-game quote) feat of dominance, in front of a sizable contingent of Montreal press, and ESPN’s Scott Burnside, that may go a real long way to forging the Gr8’s Hart Trophy award. Oh, and he did it all with a broken nose. That contract’s beginning to look really good!

Post-game reactions

  • Comcast’s Lisa Hillary asked Ovie if Tuesday night’s disappointment fueled his outburst tonight. Not so much, apparently. “My girlfriend [I knew] was coming,” he said, beaming. “That’s why,” he added chuckling.Washington Capitals Coach Bruce Boudreau
  • Olie Kolzig: “I think I might set a record for lowest save percentage with a winning record.”
  • Gabby on Ovie: “He’s an amazing person.”
  • “What was going through your mind when they tied it?” the head coach was asked. “Exactly what was going through my mind was we’ve been up 3-0 four times and they’ve come back to tie it … but we’ve won every game. That’s the first thing I thought of. So I said, we’re, ok!” [press room erupts in laughter]
  • More Gabby: “I thought it was a game we absolutely dominated the first 30, 35 minutes. They only had 9 shots … Coaches have always said get a hit early and get into the game, and he [Ovechkin] loves the challenges and you could see him going after Komisarek more than Komisarek was going at him. That’s a big boy, and when you play as much as Alex does, I mean, it doesn’t seem to tire him, and that’s good for the Capitals.”
  • On not losing consecutive games and its meaning: “It means they can play with anybody they want … We don’t have the consistency of the Detroit Red Wings or anything, but when we put our minds to it, play the way we’re supposed to play, and when we get the good goaltending like we got tonight, we’re a pretty tough team to beat.”
Filed in Alexander Ovechkin, Bruce Boudreau, Donald Brashear, Hershey Bears, Knee-Jerk, Lisa Hillary, Mike Vogel, Montreal Canadiens, Olaf Kolzig, Quintin Laing, Sami Lepisto, Washington Capitals| Permalink| Comments (11)

Training Camp for Washington Sports Editors

By pucksandbooks
Wednesday, January 9, 2008

Morning Cup-A-JoeNear 8:00 this past Saturday night, Washington’s mainstream sports editors confronted an annual dilemma: the end of another Redskins’ season. Joe Gibbs’ second retirement from football offered our local press horde a brief stay of execution from the Burgundy and Gold beat, but today the harsh reality sets in.

Their dilemma is existential: what now?

To the disappointment of Wizards’ fans, and the horror of Dan Steinberg, Agent Zero recently hinted at the likelihood of shutting it down this season to recover fully from his knee injury. Nats’ pitchers and catchers don’t report south for weeks. We’re many months away from Tiger’s return to town.

Customarily, this season in the D.C. sports calendar dictates that sports editors assign their staff the research and drafting of obituaries for American sports legends solidly on life’s back nine. Long lunches. And vacations.

We at OFB, however, think that with the arrival of Redskin-free Januaries, henceforth and inaugurating with this one, the region’s hockey bloggers, in a joint endeavor with the Washington Capitals, ought to conduct a training camp for MSM sports editors.

To introduce them to the sport of hockey.

In a very real sense, it’d be analogous to the fantasy camps the well-heeled, middle-aged, and portly participate in across all sports. Making no judgment on the physical well being of our MSM editors, it’s abundantly clear that their cognitive acumen with respect to hockey is, shall we say, under exercised. As such, the heart of our camp would feature a fully developed Capitals University for the editors. JoeB is particularly busy at this time of year, but given the claims of this cause, I’d anticipate some creative schedule juggling on his part and ultimately his cooperation.

Orientation would have to start with the most basic of basics: a Mapquest route from WaPost and the various network broadcast studios in the District to Kettler Capitals. Initially, the editors would be picked up and led to the facility by various Caps’ players in a caravan, but as part of a camp final exam, the editors would have to demonstrate their ability to navigate their own way to the Capitals’ new home.

Early on, too, it would imperative to dispel some false assumptions long held by the editors. For instance, on Day One of camp we’d have one of the region’s meteorologists present Dopler data conforming that no reporters covering Caps’ games actually freeze from the experience. Indeed, at Verizon Center, there’s the greater likelihood of visitors suffering heat stroke. It is simply not true that the Caps travel to Saskatchewan to contest their games outdoors December through March.

As part of camp, the editors would be taken on field trips to the region’s rinks — Reston, Ft. Dupont, Columbia and Cabin John — where they would be asked to view the thousands of youths, male and female, clogging the weekend clocks morning, noon, and night with the playing of hockey. They would be asked to sit in the rinks’ stands among players’ parents and interview them about families’ devotion — in finances, time, and travel — to the sport of ice hockey. The tongues the hockey families would speak in would be foreign to the editors, and so bloggers and Caps’ communications professionals like Mike Vogel would be strategically stationed in the stands to facilitate translation.

Back at camp, VIP speakers would address the editors. An emissary from the Canadian Embassy would allege that his home is not in fact a 51st American state or territory, but instead a sovereign nation which celebrates the awe-inspiring playgrounds that nature etches across his home’s landscape for half the calendar year. Executives from cable television providers would arrive and testify to the fact that indeed thousands of Washingtonian households spiritedly subscribe to NHL CenterIce and the NHL Network.

High priests of puck like Don Cherry and Barry Melrose would lunch and cocktail hour with the campers and lead chalkboard Xs and Os and endearing narratives of the sport’s legacy. Melrose would even suggest that here in Washington there is a viable Jack Adams candidate.

Craigh Laughlin and Joe Reekie would lead a discussion of conflict resolution in hockey, and how the United Nations Security Council is not involved.

A professor of comparative literature and linguistics from the University of Maryland would attend and identify the sliver of contemporary professional athletes who commonly speak to the press in complete sentences, often thoughtfully. He will introduce the editors to the concepts of humility and modesty that commonly lace these orations.

The District’s Chief of Police would brief the editors on the needlessness of bringing along weapons of self defense into the players’ rooms during interviews.

Necessarily, camp would conclude with a screening of ‘Slapshot,’ and accompanying consumption of beer would be mandatory.

To prepare for camp, we who conduct it might want to view the film ‘300,’ for in this quest we face the same odds for victory as the Spartans.

Filed in Barry Melrose, Don Cherry, Hockey Movies, Kettler Capitals Iceplex, Lisa Hillary, Media, Morning cup-a-joe, Other Sports, Redskins, Washington Capitals, Washington Post| Permalink| Comments (9)

Video Evidence

By The OFB Team
Thursday, December 20, 2007

Thanks to Comcast Sports Net’s super producer Adam, the video of the Caps’ Segway adventure that recently aired on Comcast is now available on YouTube. It’s even better than the photos. (See today’s blog entry for those.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vc8Lylkul6U

Filed in Alexander Ovechkin, Comcast SportsNet, Lisa Hillary, Nicklas Backstrom, Washington Capitals| Permalink| Comments (5)

Quarter Mark Report Card

By pucksandbooks
Wednesday, November 21, 2007

My three stars of the season’s first quarter are:

(3) Pascal Leclaire — the backstopper of the BlueJackets, disbelievingly into playoff contention, with a .940 save percentage, 1.59 goals-against (second-best in the league) and five shutouts. He’s my Vezina Trophy winner for the first quarter;

(2) Henrik Zetterberg — previously a terrific scoring forward, now a superstar, and clearly a more dynamic talent up front for the Wings than Pavel Datsyuk. Soon to be paid so?;

(1) Vincent Lecavalier — simply having his best season as a pro, the league’s leading scorer with 32 pts.; dominating his opposition and making what was believed to be a top-heavy corps of Bolts’ forwards into a first line that’s so good it matters little what contributions, if any, follow. He’s my Hart Trophy winner for the first quarter.

Honorable mention: Jarome Iginla (26 points in 19 games) is having an MVP quality season, but he’s laboring on a struggling Flames club. And Comcast, for coming through with NHL CenterIce, the NHL Network, and Lisa Hillary.

Cup'pa JoeFalling stars:

(3) the Washington Capitals

(2) Marc Andre Fleury

(1) Reebok

Midwest Mojo: Rebuilds in Chicago and St. Louis are ahead of pace and impressive. Patrick Kane is my Calder Trophy winner for the first quarter. Robert Lang, with 19 points in 20 games, and skating a +7, is giving the Hawks precisely the kind of productive, veteran leadership they’d hoped for on the top line. Still, the Hawks have issues — in their back end. They’ve surrendered 61 goals, and both Khabibulin and Lalime sport sub-.900 save percentages. But after a decade of dreariness, the Hawks are fun to watch again. The leading scorers for the Blues are greybeards Paul Kariya and Keith Tkachuk. After that, it’s a lunchpail outfit that’s outworking its opponents. There’s a lot of youth of that roster, so it may strengthen as the season progrsses. And what of Clumbus, the claimers of Jiri Novotny and Kris Beech? They are eighth in the West, and 6-2-1 at home.

In the East, Montreal and the Islanders have been stunning success stories. It’s a balanced attack in Montreal: the Habs already have eight players in double digits in scoring. And remember how everybody in hockey was pitying the Isles after the opening hours of free agency, when guys like Jason Blake, Tom Poti, and Viktor Kozlov bolted? Ted Nolan is working his second consecutive miracle on the Isle.

Might in the Michaels. Mike Richards and Mike Cammalleri have staked out take-it-to-the-bank All Star game selections. Richards (23 points in 19 games) is Philadelphia’s most consistent and dynamic performer, a point-per-game player who this season has transitioned from promising youngster to elite, captain-quality talent. His three shorthanded tallies lead the league. Cammalleri (12 goals, 7 assists) is beginning to look a lot like the Western conference’s version of Martin St. Louis.

Jolly Ole Productive St. Nik. Nik Antropov is healthy and playing virtually a point-a-game hockey for the Leafs, and skating a +9. Who knew he could? He had 33 points last season, and a high of 16 goals and 29 assists in 2002-03. Obviously he’s on pace for a career year. Alex Kovalev is on pace for 40 goals. Meanwhile, Jonathon Cheeechoo has just 3 goals in 21 games for the Sharks. Jaromir Jagr, I’m sad to report, is on pace for 16 goals this season, and Chris Drury (3 goals!) even less. Still, their Rangers have seriously heated up in the Atlantic.

Jeremy Roenick — remember him? — is outscoring Mike Modano, Brendan Shanahan, Thomas Vanek, Drury, Chris Higgins, Brian Gionta, and Patrick Marleau. One of the reasons Tampa was able to survive the loss of Dan Boyle for much of the season’s first quarter was the play of Paul Ranger: 4 goals, a +11, and an able distributor on the power play point.

It sure appears as if Peter Forsberg has played his last game in the NHL, and perhaps in pro hockey period. Next stop, the Hall of Fame. Less honorably sidelined, in my judgment, are Scott Niedermayer and Teamu Selanne, who appear to want to allow their Ducks teammates to shoulder the early regular season’s bumps and bruises before perhaps rejoining them for the stretch run and postseason. I’m sorry, but hockey players play hockey when hockey starts, not finishes. Without them, the defending champion Ducks are holding it together rather well.

Guy Carbonneau and Ted Nolan share the Jack Adams Trophy for the season’s first quarter, from my vantage. Honorable mention: Ken Hitchcock.

Filed in Calgary Flames, Chicago Blackhawks, Columbus Blue Jackets, Detroit Red Wings, Eastern Conference, Lisa Hillary, Minnesota Wild, Montreal Canadiens, Morning cup-a-joe, Nashville Predators, National Hockey League, New York Islanders, Pittsburgh Penguins, Sidney Crosby, St. Louis Blues, Western Conference| Permalink| Comments (0)

A Postcard from the Washington Capitals’ Media Day 2007

By OrderedChaos (Mike Rucki)
Wednesday, October 3, 2007

Gustafsson and I attended Tuesday’s 2007 Capitals Media Day at the Verizon Center. After opening remarks by owner Ted Leonsis, an open session followed. Here are a few highlights:

Pearls of Wisdom from Ron Weber

I struck up a conversation with Capitals radio great Ron Weber. We were both gazing out at the empty ice surface as chatted about hockey history for a bit, such as the fact that only one team, the Montreal Canadiens, used to have blue lines along the bottom of the boards rather than the standard yellow. He also (without my prompting) commented on the lack of out-of-town scoreboards and real-time clock; we were both hopeful that the cloth-draped ends of the lower ribbon displays will be unveiled as scoreboards on opening night.

The most interesting tidbit he shared with me was in the form of a question. “See the red line?” he asked. “Do you know why it’s not a solid line, but has those white spaces along the line?” I confessed that I did not. “Well,” he explained, “back when they started broadcasting hockey games, they couldn’t tell on close-up camera shots whether the player was skating over the blue line or the red line . . . because on black-and-white televisions they looked the same. So the NHL made a rule that the red line had to have those white marks, so viewers could tell the difference between the lines. Not that anyone is watching on a black-and-white TV today, but they’ve still kept it that way.”

Breathe Deep the DC Air

Dave Steckel and Lisa Hillary -- photo by On Frozen BlogAmong the many media folks at the event was Comcast SportsNet’s wonderfully friendly Lisa Hillary. Ted Leonsis, Hillary, Gustafsson and I were chatting about the upcoming season after Leonsis and Hillary taped an interview for Comcast. Leonsis apologized for his rough voice. “It’s the mold,” he explained  and I sympathized, as a few days ago I awoke with what I thought was a bad cold but was in fact a sore throat caused by the incredibly high count of mold allergens in the air. Hillary remarked on the clean Northern air, “We never had to worry about mold in Ottawa!” Welcome to DC, Ms. Hillary, and good luck in the humid, pollen-ridden, exhaust-fume-choked DC air this spring. Bring Claritin!

At right, a photo of Lisa Hillary and Dave Steckel. Steckel’s impressive camp and preseason have earned him a spot on the Capitals’ opening night roster.

Q & A with Tomas Fleischmann

OFB: You had a shorter season than most of the Caps with your Calder Cup playoff run last year. Looking back, could you imagine then that four months later you’d not only make the team, but be skating with Alex Ovechkin?

Fleischmann: You never know, this is hockey! I didn’t think about it, I just went to summer workouts and worked hard in training camp to make the top two lines . . . You have to work every day, be better every day. I’m just excited and can’t wait for our first game.

OFB: How were those Calder Cup runs, and how do you think that will prepare you for an 82-game schedule in the NHL, and hopefully the playoffs?

Fleischmann: That was a great experience . . . the first thing you have to do in the playoffs is have a good group of guys who want to win, and play for the Cup. Everyone has to do his job, and that’s what it takes. And if everything works like that, it works every time on the ice.

OFB: And you feel that’s what the Capitals have this year?

Fleischmann: Oh, exactly, that’s the way I feel.

As do we, Tomas, as do we.

Filed in Alexander Ovechkin, Comcast SportsNet, Dave Steckel, Lisa Hillary, Ron Weber, Ted Leonsis, Tomas Fleischmann, Washington Capitals| Permalink| Comments (3)

Bob McKenzie on WaPo Live Thursday

By The OFB Team
Tuesday, October 2, 2007

Bob McKenzie of TSNSet your VCRs/DVRs: Comcast SportsNet’s Lisa Hillary just informed us that her special guest on Thursday’s Washington Post Live is none other than TSN’s Bob McKenzie. McKenzie will be appearing live from Toronto, discussing the Capitals and hockey in general. The segment will also include Al Koken and Russ Thaler. The show airs from 5:00 PM – 6:00 PM on October 4.

“McKenzie has been covering hockey for the past 26 years and is one of the most respected analysts in the business. His unparalleled contacts in the hockey world, combined with an abundance of hockey knowledge and a genuine love for the game, make McKenzie the most well-informed, trusted, and connected man in the business.”[1]

A nice addition to Comcast’s ongoing Caps Week.

Filed in Comcast SportsNet, Lisa Hillary, TSN, Washington Capitals| Permalink| Comments (3)

Leafs TV? How About Caps’ TV?

By pucksandbooks
Tuesday, October 2, 2007

Cup'pa JoeApprised of Comcast’s commitment to the Caps this week, I turned on Comcast SportsNet the moment I arrived home from work Monday night, and left it there. What I watched over the next four hours stunned me.

I saw new Comcast Caps’ beat reporter Lisa Hillary studio host a season preview alongside Joe Reekie. I saw just about all of Alexander Ovechkin’s first-ever NHL game (I’d forgotten that he was a flubbed breakaway from a hat trick that night). Then I saw JoeB and Craig host another studio half hour, “Caps Speak,” for another team preview. Promos for Comcast’s “SportsNight” that followed promised even more Caps’ coverage.

It was “Monday Night Hockey in Washington,” of course.

Head Coach Glen Hanlon was interviewed in depth by Hillary. GMGM was thoughtfully interviewed, at length, and he provided his customary thoughtful replies. Key personnel — Chris Clark, Olie Kolzig, Tom Poti, Nicklas Backstrom, Michael Nylander — all took turns before Comcast’s cameras. Tarik El Bashir’s segment with Joe and Craig I thought was a highlight of the entire night. (Tarik, true to form, offered a sober and fair assessment amid the rampant optimism engulfing the organization early this autumn. The Caps, he said, could finish anywhere “from sixth to tenth” in the Eastern conference.)

Broadcast Buzz about pro hockey in D.C. these days? Umm, yes — only if you regard all-consuming, single-topic devotion by the local sports television outlet to the city’s red-headed stepchild of pro teams “buzz”-indicating. Apparently it’s going to be like this the remainder of the week each evening on Comcast.

At one point during the prime time proceedings I saw Joe and Craig flash on the screen multiple-screen listings of Caps’ prospects. I saw the names Michal Neuvirth, Simeon Varlamov, Karl Alzner, Joe Finley, Mathieu Perreault, Francois Bouchard, Dave Steckel, and Chris Bourque, all broadcast on an outlet that never in its life held an office fantasy hockey pool. Briefly, it was like a breakout from hockeysfuture, and two DraftGeeks renting out the Comcast studio and making like Wayne and Garth on local cable access.

Wayne, er, JoeB: “Look at all this talent in the pipeline, Dude!”

Garth, er, Craig (head cocked): “Excellent!”

This is what importing one Canuck can do to an outlet!

More seriously, Hillary was hired to bring her NHL coverage experience to Comcast. The in-house hockey talent was significant, if under-appreciated and grossly under-utilized, but had the outlet ever boasted a dedicated reporter on the beat? Next I’m going to allege that coverage decisions like Comcast’s for this week haven’t occurred in a vacuum, and that they’re a harbinger of better coverage to come, print and broadcast, traditional and alternative. To an extent, it’s fashionable, of course: the Caps may not make it to the postseason this year, but they will not be dull.

But of course I’m a subscriber to the theory that a media revolution for this team and its sport is well underway these days, in these parts.

I’m also, at week’s end, when this trial run on Comcast terminates, planning on becoming a subscriber to CapsTV.

Filed in Chris Bourque, Comcast SportsNet, Craig Laughlin, Francois Bouchard, George McPhee, Glen Hanlon, Joe Beninati, Joe Finley, Karl Alzner, Lisa Hillary, Mathieu Perreault, Media, Michal Neuvirth, Morning cup-a-joe, Prospects, Simeon Varlamov, TV, Tarik El-Bashir, Training Camp, Washington Capitals, Washington Post| Permalink| Comments (7)

Reflections on Training Camp’s Opening Week

By pucksandbooks
Sunday, September 23, 2007

Capitals Training Camp 2007It’s a day of rest not only for Washington Capitals’ players and coaches — well, the players at least — but for the team’s frenzied communications staff as well. Being out at Kettler as much as I have been the past 10 days, I gained a deep appreciation for the commitment of Nate Ewell, Julie Petri, Paul Rovnak, and Mike Vogel, among others. Their days during camp begin early and end late, and at this time of year they’re not only facilitating one of the heavier media flows following camp in years but also putting together the in-season communications products, such as the Media Guide. It’s forecast to be a stunning late September Sunday today, and I hope they’re all out having fun in the fun and recharging their batteries.

The pause in on-ice action is a good time to take stock of what the Caps have achieved thus far in what I believe is the most important training camp in the organization’s history. I made a point during my visits to survey the hockey-savvy heads also taking in the daily doings at Kettler, from print and broadcast reporters to fellow bloggers to fans in the stands, and herewith I’m blending their leading storylines of camp to date with my own.

  • Proud Papa. I’ve regularly seen Owner Leonsis as training camp spectator during the past 10 days, and while it’s true he’s no longer involved with the day-to-day operations of AOL, he remains a busy communications man. I think what’s happened with his training camp interest level mirrors that of the rest of us: the quality and depth of the organization on display is so impressive you are fairly compelled to make the trip out there and simply revel in the turned corner of the team’s competitiveness.
  • Nylander to line 2. Two years ago Michael Nylander left Washington as a very good hockey player. This fall he’s returned but done so appearing to be more a star. He’s a dynamic playmaker, in supreme condition. And while almost everyone in hockey this summer forecasted an Ovechkin-Nylander top-line pairing, way back in July Head Coach Glen Hanlon very publicly stated his intention of experimenting with top-6 forward combinations, and thus far in camp, the conspicuous chemistry appears to have melded among Alexander Semin, Michael Nylander, and Nicklas Backstrom as Hanlon’s second unit.
  • Slick Swede Part II. Speaking of Backstrom, he is irrefutably gaining comfort on the North American-sized sheet of ice — making progress “on a daily basis,” to quote my friend Mike Vogel. At the World Championships in Moscow in May, former Cap and Swedish National Team Head Coach Bengt Gustafsson told us that Backstrom would make that transition successfully and reasonably swiftly, and he was right. Tim Leone up in Hershey thinks it in Backstrom’s, and the Caps’, best interest for him to have a cup of coffee with the Bears this season. Ain’t happening.
  • It’s my puck, and I’m keeping it. The Caps don’t (yet) have a dominant shut-down defenseman, so Glen Hanlon’s strategy for improved defensive play this season rests with his club maintaining possession of the puck more often than in the past two seasons, when often they chased it around the rink in futile fashion. If you have the puck more often than your opposition, your goalie isn’t get apt to face 40 or 50 shots each night, and surrender five or six goals most nights. So far, this strategy appears to be taking hold. In training camp’s scrimmages and through the Caps’ first three preseason games, you can see more puck possession and fewer netminders collapsing from fatigue.
  • Captain, My Captain/Son of Kono-Dahlen-Halpern. I’ve changed my views on cloning, because of Chris Clark. Meaning no disrespect to Dale and his retired sweater, but should Clark captain the Caps to a Stanley Cup title in one of the next three seasons, he will have to be regarded as the best and most important captain in team history, having guided the team from the barrens of an unprecedented bottoming out to the promised land. And sitting here in September 2007, I wouldn’t stand in line to wager against it. (See Carolina ‘05-06, Tampa ‘03-04.)

It is Chris Clark’s team-first, two-way versatility that has Glen Hanlon fantasizing about a two-way, impact third line along the lines of the great Steve Konowalchuk, Jeff Halpern, Ulf Dahlen trio of a few years ago. That line, you’ll recall, was so dominant that Ron Wilson opened just about every game with it. It was also one that was a lynchpin to the Caps’ postseason participation. The coach has told the media that he’s looking for 60 goals from his third line this season, and given the defensive acumen of Clark and Boyd Gordon, and Matt Pettinger’s offensive pop, it’s natural to invoke the KDH comparison.

I’m also not wagering on Clark’s offensive production diminishing, dramatically, by virtue of his dropping down to line 3. As he noted himself on Media Day, he’s spent the past two seasons taking shifts against the likes of Zdeno Chara and top defensive pairings. Less so, it would appear, beginning this season.

  • Deep Depth. The Caps this weekend have 35 players battling for spots on the opening night roster. It’s reasonably easy to forecast another five cuts, but the leap from about 30 to 23 is another matter. To put it charitably, the Caps’ are in uncharted territory, post-lockout, in terms of the skater quality they’ll be showcasing out at Kettler in week two of camp. This is the most basic and encouraging sign of the overall success of the rebuild.
  • Three games, three leads. Through three exhibition games, the Caps have only once fielded a fairly veteran lineup — last Thursday night in Ottawa. They opened in Carolina, against a comparatively veteran Hurricanes’ lineup, dressing only John Erskine and Mike Green on the blueline as guys with significant NHL experience from last season (and with BJ in net). In all three games the Caps have played significant stretches with a lead (twice with two-goal leads). There remain mistakes (penalties) and concerns (penalties) aplenty, but we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that Coach Hanlon’s strategy of playing a more puck possession game is abundantly evident. In order to win more often, a team must first establish competitiveness, then achieve leads in games. The Caps have accomplished both early in this preseason.

The next step is to close the deal once you have the lead.

  • When did Toronto’s print media come to work in Washington? For the first time in my hockey life, I wake each day knowing that with my morning coffee I need to visit the web sites for both of Washington’s big newspapers in order to follow coverage there of Caps’ training camp. There are files there basically every day. And good ones. Additionally, blog files there. This is as it should be, but to our print guys — and most especially the Times’ Corey Masisak, who’s only taking on the beat of a departed legend — good on you.
  • Sharp-dressed men. It’s not anywhere near as important as the talent upgrade, but in this the autumn of uniform mischief, the Caps have showcased the best-looking new threads in the entire league. And it’s not even close. I’ll be particularly grateful when those snazzy white uniform system tops are rightfully returned to wearing on home ice.
Filed in Boyd Gordon, Chris Clark, Comcast SportsNet, Corey Masisak, Dave Steckel, Front Office, George McPhee, Glen Hanlon, Kettler Capitals Iceplex, Lisa Hillary, Matt Pettinger, Michael Nylander, Mike Vogel, Nate Ewell, Nicklas Backstrom, Prospects, Staff, Steve Eminger, Sweaters, Tarik El-Bashir, Ted Leonsis, Tomas Fleischmann, Training Camp, Washington Capitals, Washington Post, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (4)

New Face on the Beat

By The OFB Team
Thursday, July 26, 2007

Comcast SportsNet Anchor/ Reporter Lisa Hillary - photo from A-ChannelOFB has learned of a new reporter assigned to the Washington Capitals. Lisa Hillary has joined Comcast SportsNet as an anchor/reporter. Lisa will serve as the primary reporter for the network’s Washington Capitals coverage. Along with her duties with the Capitals, she will be anchoring the network’s live daily news shows, SportsRise and SportsNite.

Lisa was born and raised in Ottawa, Ontario and began her career in broadcasting as a general assignment reporter for CHUM Television in Pembroke, Ontario. She then moved to Calgary, Alberta, working for TSN anchoring the weekend edition of SportsCentre and covering the Flames along with the NFL and CFL. Her most recent assignment before Comcast SportsNet found her back at CHUM in 2005 as an anchor/reporter for A-Channel Ottawa.

A sports enthusiast who loves tennis and swimming, Lisa said this about her job in broadcasting.

“I love the interaction of broadcasting. The highlight of every day is being given the opportunity to get up close with people in the community.”

In adding to their coverage of an underserved beat, Comcast SportsNet has rewarded the Captials’ faithful with a seasoned hockey reporter. OFB welcomes Lisa to her second nation’s capital and it is our hope that she brings to her new beat a Canadian sensibility for covering hockey in this burgundy and gold town.

Filed in Comcast SportsNet, Lisa Hillary, Media, TV, Washington Capitals| Permalink| Comments (15)