Dateline, Philadelphia, January 5, 2012. Three Philadelphia Flyers fans are wanted by Philadelphia police for their role in beating two New York Rangers fans in the immediate aftermath of Monday’s Winter Classic. One of the victims was beaten quite brutally and hospitalized. Video of the assaults emerged. (You can watch it easily enough; I urge that you don’t.) The more seriously maimed victim, turns out, is a cop, an Iraq war vet, a Marine, and a Purple Heart recipient. He had the temerity to attend a big hockey game in Philadelphia wearing the colors of that day’s adversary. You know, just as has happened with every game in every arena and stadium on the continent the past 40 years. But in Philadelphia, this hero of his country was beaten for it, brutally.

I like to think that somewhere in her eternal rest Kate Smith is restless and nauseous.

To me there is something distinctive about this instance of violence relative, say, to that we witnessed in Vancouver after last June’s Stanley Cup finals. Both outbreaks are abhorrent to be sure, but there is in our sport something enduring and singular — and brandished as a badge of honor, even — by the bellicose and beer-swilling  in orange sweaters, somewhat a minority of the overall Flyers fanbase, I think, who for at least a generation have taken it as a blood oath to violently defend their allegiance.

There are fights in the stands at many rinks and ballparks, I know. But it’s really only with one civic outpost that news of them seems to be met with . . . a wildly warped sense of pride.

You see, yesterday I had to endure a soberly stated justification by a Flyers fan — a high school classmate of mine — for what transpired in Monday’s assault: that somehow the Rangers fan, likely loose of victory-bragging tongue, deserved his fate. My Flyers’ partisan high school buddy is a Duke graduate, a Gulf War vet (Marine), a lawyer, a husband and a father. And he thinks as he does in this instance. So I say he’s card-carrying member of a warped culture. I’ll still call him classmate and friend, but yesterday I wondered: just how eager would the hospitalized Rangers fan Marine be to share a foxhole with my Flyers’ friend, and would my friend really have articulated the defense he did with me in front of his daughters?

You want to say that only a tiny sliver of the Flyer fanbase could and would go perp like this, but afforded over many years ample opportunity to disavow themselves of the reputation, collectively they’ve passed. They like the reputation not just of their skating heroes being bullies but of being bullies themselves. That sweater, its wearers want you to know, represents a good deal more than division titles and Stanley Cups won. And it’s been that way for years.

I can’t say that I can recall an instance when the executive leadership of one of Philly’s professional sports teams has led some public initiative to counteract the city’s pride in its twisted embrace of being bullies. Instead, the culture of Philadelphia seems almost to celebrate that their football stadium — and theirs alone in the republic — erected a makeshift courthouse on site to address violent attacks that have become a staple of sports patronage there.

There is a seemingly lone voice of reason up there in all this — the Broad Street Hockey blog. Those bloggers did what the Flyers should have: reluctantly, but courageously, they pushed out video and narrative of this super sad story and condemned the violence. “We say so often that we don’t deserve our reputation as awful monsters moonlighting as sports fans, but when this sort of thing happens, it completely undermines everything we say on the subject,” they blogged.

By about 5:00 yesterday this story had gone viral — Fox News, NBC.com, Puck Daddy were all weighing in on the malevolence. Out of curiosity I visited the Flyers’ web site to see if the public relations damage had occasioned any concern from the team. Maybe the team wanted to intervene and assist the victims’ families in some way. Nope. A band of cretins wearing your sweater pummeled a Purple Heart vet, in broad daylight, fellas. Would it really be beneath you to show some moral leadership and remind your community that this isn’t really behavior that ought to be replicated, again, or even celebrated? This morning there is acknowledgment of injury in Philadelphia on the team’s web site — Kimmo Timonen got dinged (upper body) during last night’s game against Chicago.

I like to think that two forms of justice ultimately will visit the assailants in this crime — the formal one meted out by the courts, and then the other seldom detailed but widely understood, enacted, well out of sight, against those who harm those who sacrifice to keep us safe. More importantly, I hope at long last a story that makes you cry will occasion a leadership long lacking in a bully culture.

A devoted worshiper at the Church of Old Time Hockey, and imbued with resounding cynicism, I couldn’t help but think: We in D.C. have become so saturated with soft, perimeter play by our hockey players — most especially in spring — that it shouldn’t be surprising that some observers here find Callahan’s impression of William Wallace . . . so alien. One interpretation of the perpetual scratching of Jeff Schultz is that the Capitals’ new head coach thinks like I do.

An alternative interpretation of Callahan’s gallantry could go something like this:  That motherf*cker is damned tough to play against, and for the past couple of seasons, the talent-challenged Rangers have well reflected their captain’s grit and determination, by decree of their head coach, and given more talented clubs a real run for their money (especially in spring). Ryan Callahan is one hell of a captain. He will be one hell of an American Olympian captain as well.

Today, that talent gap with the rest of the East for New York has been closed quite a bit, and for me it’s no coincidence that playing inspired, finish-your-checks hockey the Rangers reside at the very top of the conference. Soon, they’ll get their best defenseman in the lineup (Marc Staal), for the first time this season, making them even tougher to play against. The Rangers are built the way serious contenders are — from the net out, big and brawny, with an unmistakable net-clearing ethos in front of the net, and mobile and skilled on the blueline. Served the Bruins rather well last spring.

Perhaps before we criticize another team’s captain and his teammates for excessive sacrifice and courage we ought to see to it that ours is within driving distance of the Viking, Alberta, meter of toughness and tenacity.

The Washington Capitals of the past five years haven’t exactly been known for the selfless sacrifice of their bodies for the betterment of the team, for finishing their checks. In fact, especially in spring, they have fairly earned the reputation of being a team that’s easy to play against, one that comparative lunch pale squads want to draw in the postseason. To state the obvious: there is today no Capitals player quite like Ryan Callahan, and there hasn’t been for some years. Once upon a time, though, there was. The good news is that the former Capitals’ captain is now behind the team’s bench. There, he’s attempting to change a country club culture.

He needs time — cultures, of course, aren’t changed in a week or a month.

Almost certainly, he also needs more Patrick division bodies. More on that in a moment.

Speaking of instructional moments, HBO’s ’24/7′ this month is again affording more stark relief for Capitals fans insofar as how the rugged East comports itself. Watching the intermission exhortations of John Tortorella and Peter Laviolette is not far removed from listening to the warrior words of William Wallace. At their conclusion I find myself clutching my abdomen on my couch to make sure no Rangers or Flyers stick blades make their way through the TV screen at me, and necessarily I’m reminded of the contrast Dan Bylsma brought with our guy on last year’s series (“Hit Green.”).

George McPhee hired Dale Hunter because he believed him to be the best possible coach for the Capitals at the present moment, and part of that formulation perhaps included his conviction that Hunter could be the architect for revamping both the style and ethos of the club. My guess is that Coach Hunter is taking inventory of the roster he has and will report rugged shortcomings to the GM in short order.

The arrival of 2012 really brings a demarcation moment for the Washington Capitals. To posit any plausible playoff success next spring the Caps necessarily will have to get past the pesky and gutsy and supremely sacrificing Rags, the larger and skilled Flyers and Bruins. I’m not sure that as comprised the Capitals would be favored in any series. But 2012 also brings Washington’s return to the reconstituted Patrick division. The Capitals of the past five years have been assembled to compete quite well in the softer Southeast. In the next calendar year the hockey for the guys in  red necessarily gets rougher and tougher.

Looking ahead to 2012 and beyond, there is cause for concern. When you inventory the Capitals’ prospects holdings at Hockeysfuture, with an eye toward who among just the top 15 qualifies as a North American forward prospect tipping the scales at at least 6 ’0, 180 pounds (hardly power forward in stature), the calculation is stunning: zero. Then for fun take a look at the size of the prospect holdings for the Rags, Flyers, Pens, and Devils — and just in their top 10. The Rangers are awaiting on reinforcements like Chris Kreider (6 ’2, 200), J.T. Miller (6 ’1, 198), and defenseman Dylan McIlraith (6 ’4, 215, nicknamed the Undertaker). Philly, ravaged by injury this season, has already received notable contributions from young, big-bodied North Americans like Brayden Schenn and Sean Couturier. The Pens have Eric Tangradi (6 ’4, 232), Dustin Jeffrey (6 ’1, 205), Robert Bortuzzo (6 ’3, 196), and Brian Strait (6 ’0, 200) in the pipeline. From the development perspective, we’re coming to the Patrick rechristening party next season with jockeys.

I still suggest that in hindsight it was right to draft the likes of Brian Sutherby, Nolan Yonkman, and Joe Finley. Things didn’t work out with them; injuries eviscerated their respective development. But the Capitals obviously have gotten away from drafting size and guile and grit, and beginning in 2012, they need it badly. Funny: The ‘New-look’ NHL at the top of the East these days rather resembles the old, in stature. The Capitals hold two first-round picks and potentially Colorado’s second-rounder next June. Those picks need to resemble NFL linebackers or safeties in size, and here’s hoping Dale Hunter — uniquely qualified to assess the attributes of top junior talent — is at the draft table for their selection, and subsequently their development.

The Governors’ vote was a landslide 26-4. We don’t quite know who the dissenters were (we have educated guesses), but we’re confident our guy wasn’t among them. To Ted Leonsis (and Dick Patrick), the OFB team says, from the bottom of our collective hockey heart, Thank you! With your vote you helped make Washington a better hockey town.

We are keenly aware that so small number of hockey fans in this region have no attachment to the Capitals’ Patrick affiliation of the past. And yet many of those same fans have stepped into Verizon Center on the nights of visits from the Flyers and Penguins and Rangers and felt, acutely, the different atmosphere. Ready yourselves for an entire season of it. And God willing, another generation of one of the fiercest rivalry atmospheres in all of professional sports. Our blogging team reflects individually on the moment:

Tuesday Puck Daddy identified the Caps as "winners" in the NHL's "radical realignment"

Empty Maybe: I suppose it’s odd to be so excited to see more of something you really don’t like — in this case, however, it seems perfectly natural.

I do not like the following teams: the Flyers, the Penguins, the Rangers, the Devils and the Islanders. And I’m going to be seeing a lot more of them. And not just in the regular season but in the playoffs, where true hockey hatred is forged and purified.

I get tense during the playoffs because I’m a Caps fan, and as such I know there are no sure things, no ‘easy’ match-ups. During a series against the Penguins or Flyers, however, I become positively mental. Blood-pressure raising-type mental. “Buy flowers and make reservations for a nice apologetic dinner pre-emptively” type mental.

And now I’m going to get that worked up more often.

I’m glad that the plan includes a home-and-home with every team in the league, and I’m surprised that such a radical re-shifting happened so quickly, but most of all I’m bracing myself for the playoffs. Gleefully.

Gary: I could not be more excited about the announced realignment. It’s a welcomed homecoming. More recent Caps fans probably don’t think twice about the New York Islanders. Yes they’ve been horrible for a number of years now — in no small part to ‘Genius’ Milbury — but I still hate them. Why? The playoffs in the ’80s. Similar feelings for the Penguins. Why?  Playoffs.

This realignment brings us back to our close neighbors. Short and frequent trips to the hated lands in Pennsylvania and New York.  Playoff triumphs and failures intensify with repetition with divisional playoffs. Those intense feelings carry over to regular season games.  One never really felt that with games against Atlanta or Florida.

Now the NHL needs to complete this realignment properly with the four conference names. They already know how to spell them and where they should be.

Patrick. Adams. Norris. Smythe.

Elisabeth Meinecke: One of the themes which emerged at last Thursday’s Caps-Pens battle from journalists both paid and unpaid to watch hockey games was that more games should be like the one developing below us that night: two teams that had a solid history of disliking each other elevating their level of play. Ken Dryden once said that by the time you retire, you are grateful for a good opponent, because they have only forced you to play your best. With the Caps’ new conference opponents, they’re going to be playing their best a lot more frequently.

DC SportsChick: Admittedly, I’ve only been a fan since the Southeast Division alignment, but this is a great development. It’s really hard to get excited about games with Tampa. Now, playing New York or Philly is a different story. Those are great cities to visit for an away game, and the rivalry is intense. That’s something you don’t see with Florida or Winnipeg. The realignment bring much-needed enthusiasm and excitement to the NHL.

Mike Rucki: Getting an extra home game each season against Philly, Pittsburgh, New Jersey, and the New York Rangers is a boon to both fans and owners alike. More intensity in the arena, more fans in the seats, more Ted-pleasing sold-out games. It also makes sense to keep Carolina in the division while jettisoning the Florida teams; the ‘Canes and Caps have developed a healthy dislike for each other over the years.

But perhaps most exciting is that the Capitals will have a better chance to judge their postseason chances during the regular season. With more intense play during the year, the Caps will no longer be able to finesse themselves to a division title. Now the Caps will have to succeed against bitter, physical rivals all season, and therefore should be better prepared for the inevitable postseason shift toward bruising, grind-it-out confrontations. It may be a somewhat painful transition at first, but it will improve the Capitals’ chances for playoff success by forcing the team to build the right roster — and the right attitude — to flourish in May and June.

pucksandbooks: I’m not sure I can identify a moment of greater pride being affiliated with this blog. At our inception we planted the flag of Patrick Division Reunification in the e-ground. We listened attentively to all dissent (“Atlanta’s a Top 10 market — the Thrash aren’t going anywhere!”), but ours was a position of principle and passion. So maybe this moment ought to be instructive: if you love a sport dearly, and believe rigorous reform imperative for its overall health, champion it — spiritedly, with unwavering resolve. The fight for reform may take years, but when it arrives, it’s oh so sweet — and the sweeter for the duration of the battle waged.

It’s seldom trumpeted, but hatred is part of the plasma of our sport, and the Washington Capitals have known no hatred quite like that which boiled over in the Patrick division years. And now it’s back. Seemingly miraculously!

I can’t help but think that the genesis for this amazing moment might just date back to New Years weekend, in Pittsburgh, when the Red Army made so spirited a showing at Heinz Field. Capitals’ officials forecasted 20,000 in Red marking the pilgrimage; instead, the figure was closer to 30,000, and the Army, with all of hockey watching, made the national anthem theirs and were never silenced thereafter. How could anyone have left that stadium and that atmosphere and not wondered: what if these two teams, with their iconic stars, could battle again for division titles, and in divisional playoffs?

It’s true: Chinatown today is transformed on hockey nights. It is ablaze in Red. As a Washington native I walk among the throng and have yet to grow accustomed to the spectacle, even years later. But it’s about to be transformed again. What lies ahead with Patrick Division 2.0 is the formation of elite hockey culture in a fledgling hockey town. Redskins, beware.

Realignment Heaven, nearly

Christmas-pinch me: Could it really be that in the very same week Dale Hunter is returned to D.C. legacy-honoring leadership is emerging in realignment discussions, such that our Dick Patrick in particular would feel like a kid at Christmas?

Even recently arrived OFB readers know well our disdain for the scourge that is the Southeast division. This realignment scheme — and it’s merely a proposal that could be voted upon by owners at their meeting this week — takes some serious TNT to the least interesting division in the history of pro sports. As a kissing cousin to the Great Old Patrick division, the proposal differs only with the addition of Carolina. Most importantly, it jettisons the rest of NASCAR country, miraculously sticking it to the historic Habs and Leafs — but under an intriguing premise: there would be, the thinking goes, some synergy between Canadian snowbirds who follow those Florida clubs and the elite markets way up North. Interesting.

Additionally, as part of this scheme, there appears to be something akin to an intriguing sweetheart promise to the historic North Atlantic clubs for accepting the sunbelt orphans: the very real possibility of absorbing a relocated Phoenix team, in Quebec City. The proposal posits a 16-14 split between what could be viewed as East and West alignment, and moving the relocated Coyotes in with the Habs et al would achieve 15-15 balance. I haven’t spoken to many in hockey media ever since Atlanta bolted for Winnipeg who don’t believe that Quebec City will have an NHL team within 5 years. Viva Les Nordiques! That division, even with its Southeast hangers-on, would have serious jam.

The travel for the ‘Ning and the Cats would kinda suck, sure, but who outside Florida cares? It’s the ‘Ning and the Cats, after all. What matters: the Wings are finally happy; nightmarish travel for Western clubs today is significantly repaired, insomuch as there is far greater an equality of travel among all member clubs; and the grave injustice perpetrated by Gary Bettman against Washington in the late 1990s is at long last rectified. If this scheme comes to pass (heavy lifting for it, undoubtedly), I’m sending the commish an OFB Christmas card.

Knowing that NHL owners were meeting this week to discuss realignment (in Pebble Beach, Calif. — nice winter meeting work if you can land it), I actually spent a fair portion of Saturday running errands with a pad of paper and a pen in my Jeep, concocting a variety of realignment lineups — all predicated on returning the Capitals to where they belong: back with Pittsburgh, back with Philadelphia, back with the Rangers, the Devils, and (for now) the Islanders. The problem I kept running into: what do with the Southeast dregs — basically, the Florida teams.

I tried of course pairing them with Nashville, and Columbus. Just when I’d get excited about achieving what I ultimately wanted I’d realize how many Western clubs I had to slide over to the East, creating grave imbalance. In one scenario I even had the Original Six clubs lined up together — talk about generating some serious buzz; no other pro sport could match that kinda fun. But nothing was working out as I’d hoped.

One of the creative tools I was tinkering with was assigning a value to each NHL club based on the likelihood of each one remaining located where it is today, in five years’ time. I raised this notion because when it comes to “radical realignment,” I really believe owners and managers need to consider the very real possibility that a handful of clubs in grave fiscal distress now won’t be where they are today down the road just a bit. This proposal as outlined on CBC last night takes Phoenix’s identity crisis into mind. Odds are at least one or two more clubs will be in a similar situation soon.

Ultimately, we may owe some mistletoe love to the leadership in Philly and Pittsburgh for this scheme. Understandably, those clubs didn’t want any realignment that separated them. The beauty of a reconstituted Patrick division is that it reignites some of the fiercest rivalries in all of hockey south of the border. And when you think about it, given all the Caps and Pens have done for the sport post lockout, how shallow and short-sided would it be to move forward with significant realignment and not put the Flyers, Pens, and Caps in direct warfare with one another? Detroit and Winnipeg obviously need their respective situations remedied ASAP, but thinking large on realignment fosters a big win for the league overall.

Heck, we could really have some fun with this new-look league: How about a Patrick Division Winter Classic round-robin New Years weekend? The top four teams in the division at Christmas get the invite. The stadium atmosphere would resemble European or South American soccer in its potential for violence. Sign me up.

Speaking of division names: This too Bettman needs to be called to the carpet for, and it needs to be rectified as part of radical realignment. If indeed there are four “conferences” established (the new set of four groupings apparently would each be called “conferences”), each should be named after a giant in our sport. I’m not wedded to Patrick, necessarily, for our grouping, but I do believe some blue ribbon panel ought to take All Star weekend, say, and meditate on names like Howe, Orr, Gretzky, as well as some of the builder giants that erected this league. A special trophy ought to be commissioned for each named setup.

Additional attributes of this potentially Heaven-sent setup: A more balanced schedule, featuring home-and-away dates with every club outside of one’s recast division/conference. While there is some concern with increased travel costs with this, I’m of the opinion that two factors override it: Most basically, what is it about the NHL that necessitates geographical isolation, relative to other pro sports? And isn’t there something akin to a moral obligation for the league to showcase its other-worldly talents (Crosby, Oveckin, Stamkos, etc.) in every market, every year? With the present unbalanced schedule if you’re a fan in Western Canada and Crosby’s Pens visited you while he was recovering from a concussion, you’re SOL for years. And divisional playoffs will breed new rivalries and give life to already established ones.

We in Washington are already indebted to Santa for bringing us an early Christmas present this year, but given what the league has put us through with the Southeast, we are entitled to another special gift, I say. Hockey’s greatest rivalry today ought to be organically housed, and in the process the abomination that has ever been the Southeast division ought to be, mercifully if belatedly, euthanized.

Camp convened with perhaps only one roster spot genuinely open and available among the top nine forward spots (second line center) (or is it first?). It was pursued by a small assembly of center ice men who came to be known as ‘The Bubble Boys.’  But even with this storyline the drama didn’t build greatly, as Mathieu Perreault emerged early and decisively as the top performer. He led the Caps in scoring during the preseason. And after Sunday night’s camp-concluding exhibition game against Chicago, Bruce Boudreau said of no. 85, “I think our best player all of camp was Perreault. I think he played with energy every night.” On the radio last night, Mike Vogel was similarly impressed: “He’s been consistently good throughout the preseason regardless of which line he’s been on.”

The forward ranks offered this camp its exclusive intrigue, and that was muted drama. On the blueline, the top six were set before camp started, and likewise, the Capitals’ net was set before training camp’s first conditioning whistle blew.

This drama-free state of affairs was by design. In the middle of the offseason the GM overhauled his roster heavily for size and grit and experience up front on the wings, some character and a former captain’s experience and leadership to center the fourth line, and then the ultimate offseason coup — Tomas Vokoun. Offseason changer, that.  Training camp quickly became more a dress rehearsal than an audition.

Camp’s top storylines:

• As important as McPhee’s offseason roster moves were, it was what the GM did at his office keyboard while the wounds of another short postseason were still raw that likely set in motion the business-like tenor of this training camp. At camp’s dawning the Washington Post reported that early in the offseason that Capitals’ players were issued a written warning about changed expectations for fitness for duty come September:

” . . . players received letters early this summer warning them to expect an Albert Haynesworth-like timed fitness test with controlled recovery intervals at the start of camp.’

That was George McPhee the enforcer enforcing a culture change for his hockey club. Overdue, in my opinion. May it be the last time Albert Haynesworth’s name is evoked in connection with the Capitals.

• More on the conditioning/work ethic/maturation front: Ben Raby, writing for the Toronto Star, got captain Ovechkin to concede that his 2010-11 showing wasn’t up to par on a number of fronts. He approached last season looking past its regular season toward the postseason, and sacrificed his conditioning in the process. His owner took note:

“He tried something different,” Caps owner Ted Leonsis said. “He wanted to work his way into shape so that he would peak during the playoffs.”

Indeed, Ovechkin admitted that all year he “just wanted to be ready for the playoffs.

“I was starting, like, in the middle (of the season) to be in shape.”

• Vitally important testimony attesting to the Capitals fall-time fitness arrived at the dawn of training camp, from team strength and conditioning coach Mark Nemish.  “I already know [Ovi's] in shape; I can tell. “We’ve worked several times on the ice and, without a doubt, he’s in the best shape I’ve ever seen him.”

• The kiss or death . . . or well considered wooing?: The Hockey News tabbed the Caps as 2012 Stanley Cup champions.

• The GM sure likes his hockey club. At CapsCon, he told the assembled thousands that this year’s squad reminded him very much of the ’97-’98 club — the one that advanced to the Stanley Cup finals. “It’s going to be a hard team to play against. Maybe not as offensive, but more physical.” Superb coverage of CapsCon from the Examiner’s Michael Hoffman here.

• If the Caps hoped that Vokoun would inspire Michal Neuvirth it appears early on to have worked. Neuvy was especially strong this preseason. There may not be the 60-20 split in games between the two that a lot of folks thought about three weeks ago.

• McPhee also chimed in on realignment, all but stating that 2011-12 would be, mercifully, the final season for the Southeast division. What it’s looking like now: two 15-team conferences with 8- and 7-team divisions within. Apparently a popular plan would see the Capitals reunited with the New York clubs and the Flyers in a division. I say, why go halfway — get the best rivalry in all of hockey, and one of the best in all of sports, rekindled as well. Anyway, when it’s official, OFB I think will host a realignment party in town, where we’ll give away NASCAR posters and coupons for Waffle House. And certainly we’ll have a Gary Bettman pinata.

• Netgate.

• Camp standout: Dmitri Orlov. Still with the team partially because of John Erskine’s rehab, but also because he’s played with poise and impact that belie his years this preseason. Stock seriously on the rise.

• Camp standout, on the air: John Walton. If you haven’t given much thought to following Caps hockey on the radio in recent years, you should now.

• One of the biggest stirs in camp perhaps came with the team in Chicago for a game, and when red, white, and blue old timers returned to Kettler for the organization’s first-ever alumni game. Old timers Alan May and Kevin Kaminski drew blood from dropped gloves. I got a good chuckle from learning that Killer had earned the first-ever Alumni Game’s first-ever first star of the game designation.

• Don’t overlook this sidebar to the new season: the trading of Semyon Varlamov delivered to the Caps Colorado’s first-rounder next June. McPhee really likes the ’12 draft — it’s much stronger than this past June’s, he intimated at CapsCon. You might want to take a look at where Adam Proteau has the ‘Lanche finishing out West this season.

What might this season’s lines look like?

Ovi – Backstrom – Brouwer

Semin – MJ90/Perreault – Knuble

Chimera – Laich – Ward

Hendricks – Halpern – Beagle

Love those third and fourth lines.

I should hate the Bolts; they just beat our ass badly, after all. But they’ve dusted off the Caps twice in a decade, and when you think about it, who hasn’t? None of their fans came to Verizon Center for games 1 and 2 of round two, and small wonder — they’re like a thousand miles away.

Ah, the absence of Tampa fans; it’s a prime theme in a brilliantly conceived and devilishly cunning Boston Bruins ad campaign — or it was, rather, until a Tampa tirade of telephone calls closed it down. Meaning, I’m resurrecting it here.

The Bs of course have carried off this fabulous mascot-driven humor campaign in print and video spots the past few seasons. We’ve sung its praises here. It’s simply magnificent. And it bloomed beautifully in Beantown for this year’s Eastern Conference finals, but as Greg Wyshynski noted in his treatment of this matter, the Bs have run it for each and every postseason opponent the past two springs. It’s Tampa’s hockey fans who singularly took offense to it. The aforementioned DJ, for whom I haven’t enough respect to ID, led a campaign of on-air ire against it, and urged his listeners to swamp Bruins’ telephone lines with complaints. Enough of them did, the Bs probably figured it was easier just to take the ads down and be done with the diaper set from the South, and that’s that. Some fun was had, but it should have continued.

Still, let’s enjoy more of this spirited smack — and you can find a helpful gallery of the art at massholesports.com.

To state the obvious, no way you’d hear any outcry about this sort of campaign from fanbases in Philly, New York, or Pittsburgh. Those are real hockey communities with appropriately toughened sensibilities. Tampa surely bettered D.C. where it counts, on the ice, but at least we have our dignity. Finally, though, I’ve found rationale to take interest in a Southeast foe’s fate in spring. Go B’s.

An agreement to sell the National Hockey League’s Atlanta Thrashers to a Winnipeg group which plans to relocate the franchise to the Manitoba capital is done.

Sources confirmed tonight that preparations are being made for an announcement Tuesday, confirming the sale and transfer of the Thrashers to True North Sports and Entertainment, which owns and operates the Manitoba Moose of the American Hockey League and the MTS Centre arena, which would become the NHL team’s new home.

Before there was Matt Hendricks, Killer — all 170 pounds of him — jumped over the boards at old Capital Centre and made life miserable for Capitals’ opponents. Sized for a bowling league, he was a one-man wrecking crew, walloping foes with thundering body checks and perfectly playing the role of instigating pest. He dropped the gloves, Mike Vogel tabulated, 33 times in 132 games with the Capitals, and it wasn’t uncommon for him to yield half a foot and 50-plus pounds in the engagements. You’ll be surprised at the outcome of many of those seeming mismatches when you watch the video of Killer we’ve compiled.

You’ll also have a chance to get to know Killer better when he appears this Saturday on WTOP’s ‘Saturday Night Caps’ for the full hour at 6:00 with Jonathon Warner, Ben Raby, and me, and we’re expecting reminiscences over the phones from some A-lister Caps’ alumni who skated with Killer here. Killer will taking a tour of a lot of media here this weekend.

Archival footage of the Capitals’ first 25 years isn’t so easy to come by, but with Killer’s help we’ve been able to edit together some fun video that lavishly illustrates the impact he had on hockey while in Washington. We even found footage of him in a local bar opposite Melissa Stark, then of Home Team Sports! One word of advice as you watch the video below, and it’s the same advice Killer dispensed on virtually every shift he took with the Caps — Keep your head up!