[NHL.com Recap - WashingtonCaps.com Postgame Coverage]Man, that was one long game. Countless turnovers resulted in little or no flow and conditions were, to put it kindly, less than ideal. But, in the end, the veteran leader that you thought would come through for his team did and the
- A goalie shouldn't have to gor 3-for-3 in the shootout in order for his team to win. Luckily, Olie Kolzig did.
- For the second straight game, Milan Jurcina led all Caps' defensemen in ice time and looked good doing it with five shots on goal, three blocked shots and a plus-one rating. Obviously it's a small sample size, but so far, so good.
- "Hits" is a notoriously subjective stat category, but objectively, the fact that defensemen Jurcina, Shaone Morrisonn, Jamie Heward and Jeff Schultz combined for zero of them isn't terribly impressive.
- The Caps' power-play is still broken, with little in the way of puck possession in the offensive zone and no quality scoring chances being generated (other than those for the opposition).
- Alex Semin had the game-winning shootout goal but his stat of the day is four takeaways and zero giveaways. It was good to see him play a more responsible game after his awful game in Pitt a day earlier, but it would be nice to see him share the puck a bit more.
- The third line of Matt Pettinger, Boyd Gordon and Richard Zednik was by far the Caps' best line, and if they can keep producing at a reasonable level, the Caps would, on paper at leat, have three lines contributing down the stretch.
- With Matt Bradley back in the lineup, Kris Beech and Ben Clymer sat, as predicted by some.
- Former Caps Brenda Witt and Chris Simon got chippy with Brian Sutherby on a number of occassions. I wonder what that's all about.
- Isles' blueliner Sean Hill did a good job containing Alex Ovechkin, clearly familiarizing himself with AO's "go to" moves prior to the game. With nothing to show for his efforts on Saturday either, AO is now scoreless in back-to-back games for the first time all season.
- Rick DiPietro looked great for New York. They should think about locking him up with a long-term deal.
- There were at least three (four? five?) stoppages in the game for glass-related repairs. Add that to the numerous offsides, icings, penalties, etc., and I'm not sure but this may have been the second-longest Caps-Islanders game of all-time.
The Caps will welcome Boston to the VC on Tuesday night as the top-pairing of Jurcina and Morrisonn will get a chance to show their old team what they gave up on. Hopefully the B's will leave town drooling the drool of remorse on the pillow of regret.
Daily Awards- Hart: Sheldon Souray (Game-winning OT goal, 2A, +1, 2 SOG, 3 blocked shots)
- Ross: Sheldon Souray, Tomas Plekanec (3 points each)
- Norris: Sheldon Souray (see above)
- Vezina: Olaf Kolzig (31 saves on 32 shots against through OT, 3 saves on 3 shots against in shootout)
- Richard: Tomas Plekanec (2G)
- Calder: Jordan Staal (G, 2 SOG)
- Aiken: Brooks Orpik (0 points, -2, on ice for last three Montreal goals in 4-3 OT loss)
8 comments:
I think that Semin dishes the puck pretty well in the d-zone and in the neutral zone (he had one very pretty backhand feed from one blue line to someone at full-speed on the other side of the ice), but when he enters the o-zone, yes, he sees red sirens.
And given how we've seen Jurcina look in two games, he doesn't seem like the kind of D you'd trade for a middle-round pick. Therefore his major problem in BOS must have been inconsistency, right?
I think so, but it may have been more inconsistency in effort than inconsistency in results, as the latter is to be expected from a 23-year-old (especially a big guy like Jerky).
And if I'm thinking of the same pass by Sasha that you're describing, it was a beauty - tape-to-tape - but I'm not sure it wasn't actually intended for a Cap skating down the middle and just a bit long.
1) Both teams looked like they played the night before. Very slow pace.
2) Five stoppages to fix glass? This game was in the (reletively) new Verizon not the crappy old Nassau Coliseum right?
3) Jurcina is already a top 4 defender? Didn't take long. Gotta wonder what they were thinking in Boston. Way too early to give up on a guy like that. Not like Boston has a boat load of promising young defensemen in their system
You are so funny, I love your site. Always very clever. Thanks for the good work.
"drooling the drool of remorse on the pillow of regret"
Classic. Very funny.
I can't take credit for that one - I think it's an old Keith Olbermann line.
Boston does have young defensemen in their system. It just so happens that they think the Caps are 'their system.'
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