Off Wing Opinion

The good news is as the games become less and less, the Caps' playoff math becomes easier and easier. If they win out, and either the Canes, Bruins, Flyers, or Sens lose at least two, the Caps are in. If you want to get more technical you can, but that's the simple breakdown.

This all starts with tomorrow night's game against Carolina. According to Corey;

There was a pretty common theme with the players in the room after practice. It doesn't matter if they are young, old or in between, there is a lot of anticipation and excitement about tomorrow night. Brooks Laich laid out the scenario pretty well, saying if they win tomorrow there is a good chance they will make the playoffs, but if they don't it will be awfully, awfully tough.

Tarik echoes that sentiment, noting that;

I just left the dressing room here at KCI, and if there's any tension, I sure didn't feel it. The Caps looked and sounded loose and excited about the challenge that is before them.

Hopefully being loose and ready is the key to victory. It's nice to see they aren't getting too wound up beforehand. But don't be fooled, when it's time to drop the puck they will be hungry for blood.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 31st, 2008 at 4:54 pm by Joe Dumas and is filed under 2007-08 Washington Capitals. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Well yesterday couldn't have gone any better. Yes I know we got our 2 points in the shootout, but hey, that means my hometown B's managed to come away with 1. I'd take a 3 point game between these two teams any day. The Caps won a mostly boring game, but a win is a win. Caps Nut seems to be less than pleased with the play of Semin and Kozlov, even though both scored in the shootout to get the Caps the extra point. But we can all agree that Huet saved the game.

This game could have been much uglier had Huet not been his sparkling self against the team he has owned in his career, and that number one star moniker is only fitting for his performance today. There were other good performances - Laich, Bradley, Semin - but Huet was the reason for the two points today, without question.

And on the heels of that performance Huet will get the start against Nashville tomorrow night. The other big news, courtesy of Tarik, is that Chris Clark may play tomorrow night.

Chris Clark was among the players who did skate, and afterward the team captain confirmed that he plans to travel with hopes of playing, possibly as soon as tomorrow. He said he would wait until the morning before deciding whether or not to suit up.

And with that said nothing is more fitting than the quote Brooks Laich gave explaining his recent goal-scoring outburst.

"If you want money, go to the bank. If you want bread, go to the bakery. If you want goals, go to the net."

When Clark comes back that will make two guys who can crash the net and bang pucks, and generally harass the goalie and defense. It will be interesting to see if the offensive schemes of the Caps change when they get two lines together that have a big guy that can park in front of the net.

And lastly, pucksandbooks over at OFB has a great piece on the allure of the pre-game warmup. For players it is routine, for fans, mesmerizing.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 17th, 2008 at 6:43 pm by Joe Dumas and is filed under 2007-08 Washington Capitals. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Sorry for the absence, but it seems like I do more work at home on break then I do at school. Crazy I know.

Well yesterday was another horrible chapter in the Pens-Caps history book. Having missed the game, I saw the youtube clip of Backstrom snapping the puck past Huet, and it was shades of Bill Buckner. This wasn't exactly the Stanley Cup finals, but it hurt Caps fans just as bad. The fact that Crosby got credited with the goal makes it that much worse.

The two losses on the weekend make it that much harder for the Caps to sneak into the playoffs, as they are 6 points out of the 8th seed and 7 points out of the Southeast lead. With only 12 games to go, they need to do something special to make the postseason. Going back to baseball, if the Rockies can finish off their season winning 14 of their last 15, then maybe the Caps can put together an equally-impressive run. Says The Peerless;

The Caps do not have to win out to make the playoffs, but it

This entry was posted on Monday, March 10th, 2008 at 6:01 pm by Joe Dumas and is filed under 2007-08 Washington Capitals. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.