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After losing game two last Friday night, New York Rangers Coach John Tortorella said he felt his team was close and that they had some momentum heading into game three despite trailing their best of seven series, 2-0, to the Washington Capitals. The Caps talked about the storm they’d likely face from the Blueshirts in game three and their ability to be able to weather it. Well, Washington managed to survive a first period that included killing off an 85 second five on three Rangers power play, but in the final two periods they got into penalty trouble, had some sloppy shifts in their own zone, and lost on a Brandon Dubinsky tally with 1:39 remaining in regulation. The 3-2 New York victory cuts the Capitals series lead to two games to one with game four set for Wednesday night at Madison Square Garden.

Here are the highlights and analysis from a blown opportunity to take command of this series by the Caps:

- Plain and simple, the Rangers outworked the Capitals in this contest. New York wanted this one more and it showed on the ice. The Blueshirts talked about getting more traffic and presence around rookie goalie Michal Neuvirth (32 saves) and they did just that. Two of their three tallies were the result of storming the crease and they missed by less than a second on getting a fourth at the end of period two in similar fashion. The only thing that saved Washington there was the green light going on as the puck was on the goal line. Tortorella’s crew made a concerted effort to drive to the net this entire game, often times taking liberties with Neuvirth. But with the officials not calling those type of infractions and clamping down on the stick work, the Rangers had things refereed in their favor, but more on that later.

- Alexander Ovechkin (1 goal, 1 assist, -1), after game one, mentioned that if you make a mistake in your own zone it is likely going to end up in the back of your net. The Caps did that too often on Sunday afternoon. Both of the last two Rangers goals were the result of the Caps being out of position defensively. On goal two, a rebound tally by Vinny Prospal, Jason Arnott and Ovechkin appeared to switch positions on the ice and Matt Bradley got caught too low off of his point man, Marc Staal. Karl Alzner got tied up with Marian Gaborik in front, so Neuvirth didn’t get a good look at the shot from #18, and the biscuit hit #30 then fell on the doorstep where #20 slammed it home eight minutes into period three. After Mike Knuble tied the game up on a power play with just over five minutes to go, Dubinsky scored the game winner in a four on four situation where Ovechkin, Scott Hannan, and Alzner each had chances to stop #17′s progress to the net. Ovechkin fell to the ice in the left wing corner, Hannan got tied up with Ruslan Fedotenko allowing Dubinsky to get a lane below the goal line, then Alzner hesitated a hair in front of the net, and #17 banked the biscuit off of #27 into the goal for the game winner. Sloppy defense and hard work by New York led to the two goals and that was the difference in the hockey game.

- Neuvirth played well for the most part, especially with Sean Avery and Brandon Prust in his face or hitting him all night. Both #16 and #8 violated the rules but referees Chris Rooney, Tim Peel, and Frederick L’Ecuyer, who replaced Rooney early in the second period when #5 was injured (broken fibula per Jeff Marek of HNIC), chose to allow that stuff to continue despite pleas from the Capitals bench to put a halt to it. #30 was superb on the Rangers 1st period 5 on 3 and he made numerous big stops, but the first goal he gave up to Erik Christensen from a bad angle on the power play cannot go in. Neuvy got caught cheating and #26′s super laser found the top of the cage short side to give New York another jolt of energy. Neuvirth is a fierce competitor and needs to come back with a strong game four.

- Washington scored their second power play goal of the series to tie the game as Knuble banged home a rebound of a Backstrom shot after Ovechkin made a super pass that split the Rangers PK box. The Caps other two PP opportunities were a mixed bag. Brooks Laich got some point time again and while, in general, I like that he shoots the puck a lot, he needs to do a better job of when to fire away. A couple of his shots were easily blocked and a little more patience would have helped. Overall the Capitals power play is two for eight in the series (25%), they just need to get more chances, but more on that next.

- After a combined total of nine power plays in games one and two, there were 10 power plays in this contest. New York had seven and the Caps only received three in a contest that was clearly called differently than the two at the Verizon Center. The injury to Rooney changed the playing field as L’Ecuyer is not a guy who should be doing playoff games. The Caps do have a beef with the zebras allowing the extra curricular stuff on their goalie plus unneccessary head shots to Mike Green and Caps Coach Bruce Boudreau and General Manager George McPhee have two days to drill that into the NHL Supervisor of Officials for the series. However, if you look at all of the calls against Washington, the only one I could say that was not a penalty, by the letter of the law, might have been the holding minor on Hannan. Once the interference on Matt Hendricks was called in period one the Caps should have realized that things were changing but they kept taking infractions of the lazy variety. The Rangers had their share of holding and interference but they got away with it more because they were moving their feet while Washington glided and used their sticks, for the most part. In addition, taking so many penalties caused Boudreau to have to use his PKers more and that took a lot of ice time away from Ovechkin, Arnott, and Semin. Lastly on the penalty front, the Capitals can’t get into post whistle scrums because it also hurts the rotation. If Carlson doesn’t go off with Brian Boyle late in the game then he is on the ice with Alzner on the 4 on 4 and Dubinsky likely doesn’t get to the net. #74 is a righty, so he would have had his stick in the lane #17 took below the goal line, and therefore could have more easily knocked the puck away from Dubinsky. Carlson needs to keep his head because he is far more valuable on the ice than in the penalty box.

- In closing, the Capitals, to a man, need to realize the referees did not cost them this game, a lack of hard work and resolve did that. Sure the officials played a role in their defeat but if Washington plays harder and smarter, the calls would have likely been more even (then again, we are talking about L’Ecuyer). New York did a better job of moving their feet and therefore, got the seven power plays and won the game. Boudreau and McPhee are the only ones who should be working the media and the league about the officials at this point, not the players. This is where it is important that the Capitals get past that and put everything they can into working harder than New York on Wednesday.  The Rangers, who are a resilient bunch, have the momentum right now and with their crowd support will likely come out strong again in game four. But the Capitals are the better team and need to show that. They must remember what it felt like to lose a 3-1 series lead last year, use that pain to generate a killer instinct, and jump on New York early on. They should be the team possessing the puck more and getting in Henrik Lundqvist’s grill, not the other way around. Boudreau needs to make some minor tactical adjustments to help Washington better use their speed advantage. Tortorella made his tweaks to his lines and got a victory, now it is up to Bruce, combined with a message to get focused on working hard from veteran leaders like Arnott, Knuble, and Hannan, to help put the Capitals in control of this matchup again.

Notes: Green led the Caps in ice time with 22:52…Dubinsky played 25:45, the most for either team…the Caps got outhit 41-29 and lost the faceoff battle, 45-35. Boyd Gordon was 11-5 but Arnott lost 15 of 19 draws. Chris Drury only played 7:58 for the Blueshirts but won 15 of 19 from the dot…The Hershey Bears got 22 saves from Braden Holtby in their 4-2 victory over Charlotte on Sunday afternoon at the Giant Center. Bears D-man Dmitry Orlov was +4 with an assist. The series is tied with game 3 in Charlotte (Carolina’s AHL team) set for Tuesday night.

In the NHL playoffs, the ability for one team to make adjustments and seize momentum when behind in a series is key to winning and turning things around. On Friday night at the Verizon Center the New York Rangers, who were down 1-0 after losing game one in overtime, came out hard in the first 10 minutes against the Washington Capitals but Michal Neuvirth stood strong in net and then the Caps took over in the second period scoring two goals in the first five minutes en route to a 2-0 victory. Jason Chimera tallied after some hard work by Scott Hannan and Brooks Laich help set up a beauty of a pass by rookie Marcus Johansson to #25 to put the Caps on the board. 117 seconds later Jason Arnott buried a deflected Mike Green shot into the cage on the power play to make it 2-0. The Capitals then went into a defensive posture in the final frame and now lead the series two games to none as this matchup moves to Madison Square Garden for game three on Sunday (NBC, 3 pm) and game four on Wednesday.

Here are the highlights, quotes, and analysis from a game which ended with New York pretty much trying to play rugby:

- The Caps overall team defense was outstanding and that includes everyone from the goalie, to the blue line, and the forwards. Neuvirth had to face 13 shots in the opening frame but there weren’t a lot of quality chances. After that the Rangers only got nine more shots and just six in a third period that Coach John Tortorella felt his team dominated. The best save for #30 came on Marian Gaborik in the slot in the final 10 minutes. In another goal mouth scramble really late, the Rangers fired wide in tight and then a shot destined for an open goal was blocked by John Erskine’s skate. As John Keeley of On Frozen Blog pointed out to me following the contest, Washington blocked 21 shots to only 15 for New York and it is clear that this year’s Capitals team is more committed in their own zone.

“They’ve been buying in since the middle of December. I said it many times, they just want to win. They’ve all said it to a man. I think the important thing is that they get success. We’ve had a lot of guys that have won a lot of awards and that doesn’t mean anything to them now. The success of what could happen is what they want. So when we started changing this a little bit they said if it’s going to work, we’re going to do it,” said Caps Coach Bruce Boudreau on Washington’s improved defensive abilities.

An example of that defensive commitment was how Washington countered a major offensive tactic from New York in Friday’s game. The Rangers repeatedly tried to get the puck behind the Caps net, have a forward go one way in an attempt to drag Neuvirth and the Washington defenders in the direction the player was going, and then backhand the biscuit behind them to a teammate at the back post for an open net. Tortorella’s crew used this play in the neighborhood of 10 to 15 times with no sale. In fact, the Capitals routinely had a defensemen or a forward covering the back post and centers Backstrom and Johanssson were superb at snuffing that play out. Green pointed out the forward support as a big reason why the Caps were able to blank New York on the scoreboard.

“[That play] was just something we picked up throughout the game. You just have to be in the right position as a d-man or else you are going to get caught. Not only that our forwards were helping collapse down to the net so even if they did get a chance they didn’t have much time,” said Green on how they stopped a play New York clearly thought would bring them success versus the Caps.

- Washington has a speed advantage on New York and they used that in period two to dominate the game and get the lead. The Capitals did a good job of getting pucks deep in that middle frame and they didn’t make the big turnover in the neutral zone or inside the offensive blue line that can lead to odd man rushes. The Rangers may have had one or two of those type of breaks all night, if that. The second period dominance by the Caps came from Washington using their speed to create offense in transition. It is something the Caps must continue to do to win this series.

- The advantage of having a 2-0 game lead heading into the third period for the Caps is that Coach Bruce Boudreau could pretty much roll his lines and keep everyone fresh. The Washington ice time leader was Hannan with a modest 21:34 and he played just 18 seconds more than Karl Alzner. #27, who appeared to get knicked on his first shift, was a beast in this game. He had three more team leading blocked shots (tied with John Erskine and Nicklas Backstrom) in game two and has 11 total in the series. He was superb at getting the puck out of his zone and it was his heads up long bomb off of the boards that gave Alexander Ovechkin a breakaway in the third period. Henrik Lundqvist (16 saves), however, made a big sprawling stop on the Great #8 to prevent the roof from being blown off of the Verizon Center. For the Rangers, Tortorella once again relied on his top d-pair of Marc Staal and Dan Girardi and both played roughly 23 and a half minutes. Those two have to be wearing down.

- Green, in his second game back since a long absence due to a concussion, was the target of several Rangers hits. He played just 16:27, took a high stick from Ruslan Fedotenko in period two, and late in regulation Brandon Dubinsky hit him hard up high in the Washington zone. But #52 told me that #17′s hit was not a penalty and he was just finishing his check. Green also said he was fine and he talked to the media for over seven minutes after the contest, which is far above the norm.

- So the Caps have a 2-0 series lead and their mettle will be heavily tested by a desperate Rangers club at The Garden on Sunday at 3 pm. Washington has done a good job of playing this series one shift at a time so far. They were a little complacent in the third period on Friday night and as a result, Tortorella felt pretty good about his team’s efforts despite the loss. In his mind, he thinks they have some momentum but need to score to feed off of that. But as Mike Vogel and I discussed after the post game press conferences, the Blueshirts only had six shots in the 3rd and the Caps had two quality chances with the Ovechkin breakaway and Backstrom’s steal and wraparound chance. So I am not sure that New York has much momentum but let them think that. Washington has a chance to put New York in a serious hole and will need to play more like they did in the middle period of Friday’s tilt when they really had the Rangers on the ropes. If they find a way to keep the momentum on their side then they have a good chance to take a commanding 3-0 series lead.

Notes: Semin’s hard work off of the faceoff allowed him to get the puck to Ovechkin (1 assist), who then fed Green for his shot that fortuitously clipped Matt Gilroy’s stick and went orthogonally to Arnott for the power play tally. The way the puck went right to #44 was lucky, but you need that to win in the playoffs…#28 did take a bad hooking penalty late in period two but Washington killed that one and the other Rangers man advantage…the Caps PP goal stopped a playoff streak of 20 straight advantage situations without scoring (h/t to Ted Starkey of The Washington Times for that stat)…the NHL Off Ice official tallying hits on Friday night had a very busy evening in this physical game. The Caps won that battle, 38-35…John Carlson logged 20:25 but he was in the locker room for about eight plus minutes of game time in period one. #74 took a shot off of the right leg, went to the bench at the whistle, and then ran down the tunnel. My guess is it was either an equipment problem or he got cut and needed minor repairs. Either way he came back and played a strong final 50 minutes… Johansson was +1 and had an outstanding night. His play in his own zone is top notch and the pass to Chimera on the game winning goal was of the elite variety…the Caps won the faceoff battle, 29-28 with Boyd Gordon going 8-4 while Laich won 6 of 9 draws…Rangers super pest Sean Avery tried to stir things up in a third period in which he received nearly six minutes of ice time. At one point, #16 tackled Semin after a whistle and didn’t receive a penalty. He did do a good job of forechecking and he had three shots on goal…Defensemen Dennis Wideman skated on his own for about 15 minutes today at Kettler Iceplex, which is very encouraging news. He could be back faster than originally thought.

After last night’s 2-1 overtime victory at the Verizon Center in a game in which they dominated most of the play, the Washington Capitals have to feel pretty good about themselves and their ability to succeed in low scoring games in the post season. The Caps played solid defense and for the most part didn’t give the Rangers many opportunities to score.

But that game is history now and you can bet your bottom dollar that New York Coach John Tortorella will make some adjustments for game two. The Rangers didn’t generate a lot of offense and Greg Schimmel of The Washington Post is reporting that the 2004 Stanley Cup Champion bench boss had Erik Christensen playing on the Blueshirts top line flanked by Vinny Prospal and Marian Gaborik in practice on Thursday. If true, this is essentially an “All Offensive Eggs in One Basket” move by New York. All three of those guys have a decent history against the Caps and those of you who read my series preview know that not giving #20 and #10 time and space was a key determinant of success in this series for Washington.

The Caps defensemen did a very good job of keeping Rangers forwards away from goalie Michal Neuvirth. #30 didn’t allow many rebounds and was able to see almost all of the shots he faced. In nearly four periods of play there were only 25 total New York shots on net, so Tortorella can’t be happy at all with that. Thus, I expect that super pest Sean Avery may just get a sweater on Friday night to try and agitate the Capitals and their young goalie. The key for Washington will be to not get caught into his crazy antics and take stupid penalties. Avery has been benched recently for a reason, and he has a tendency to hurt his team when he gets carried away, but if he manages to get his head screwed on straight for 60 minutes he can be a very effective player. I say New York rolls the dice and #16 is in on Friday.

Washington managed to get a win on Wednesday night in a game where Henrik Lundqvist nearly stole one for the Rangers. There is no doubt that New York will be loaded for bear on Friday night. As I said on On Frozen Blog TV after Wednesday night’s game, the Rangers are a team that never quits, they are a resilient bunch. The Caps will once again be tested on their mental strength and their ability to stick with their system and play it one shift at a time. There is no other way for them to win this series. They need to be focused and remain committed to what Caps Coach Bruce Boudreau is selling.

Game starts at 7:30 pm on Comcast Sports Net.

The National Hockey League announced their first round Stanley Cup Playoff schedule on their own television network (The NHL Network) on Sunday night at 10 pm. So without further adieu, here is the schedule for the matchup between the Washington Capitals and the New York Rangers:

Game 1: Wednesday, April 13 at Washington, 7:30 p.m.

Game 2: Friday, April 15 at Washington, 7:30 p.m.

Game 3: Sunday, April 17 at New York, 3:00 p.m.

Game 4: Wednesday, April 20 at New York, 7:00 p.m.

*Game 5: Saturday, April 23 at Washington, 3:00 p.m.

*Game 6: Monday, April 25 at New York, TBD

*Game 7: Wednesday, April 27 at Washington, TBD

So the series starts hot and heavy with three games in five days before there is a two day break leading up to game four in Madison Square Garden. Game five, if necessary, would be in Washington on NBC at 3 pm on April 23rd. Game three is also on NBC while the series opener will be shown on VERSUS and also Comcast Sports Net (CSN).

For the Caps, this is what they’ve been waiting nearly 12 months for, a shot at redemption after blowing a 3-1 series lead to the Montreal Canadiens last spring. The Capitals have made some big changes to their roster, and more importantly, have become a better defensive team since the debacle against the Habs in 2010. Defensemen Mike Green is expected to return to the lineup for game one while Dennis Wideman is pretty much out for the first round.

With the high expectations comes pressure for Washington. Caps Coach Bruce Boudreau and captain Alexander Ovechkin are under the microscope locally and across North America. The change in style has certainly lowered the glamorous statistics that several individuals on this club historically enjoyed and Boudreau did a superb job of getting his club to forget individual awards, point totals, and big contracts to focus on winning when it matters most. The Great #8 has been adamant that all he cares about is winning and the fact that he and Alexander Semin have been spending lots of time with trade deadline acquisition Jason Arnott is an indicator that these guys are tired of the playoff loser label.

Here are my keys for the Caps to win this series:

1. Match the Rangers physical intensity – New York, who are coached by the very intense John Tortorella, will have a pretty simple game plan to dump the puck and try and hit the Caps to death. Washington needs to be ready for that and the best way to beat that is to get the Blueshirts to be the ones constantly turning and chasing the puck in their own zone. The Caps must be physical and willing to take the body. Finesse will not win against New York and the Capitals cannot turn the puck over at the offensive blue line. The Rangers outscored the Capitals 18-6 in the four games played this season so there is absolutely no reason for the Caps to be overlooking New York. The Rangers are mostly a young, blue collar type of team but they do have some snipers in Marian Gaborik and Cap-killer Vaclav Prospal. The best way to get numbers 10 and 20 off of their game is to get in their grill and hit them. Washington must not allow these two pure goal scorers to find space in the Caps zone where they can set up shop and unleash their deadly shots.

2. Get traffic in front of Henrik Lundqvist – King Henrik is one of the best goalies in the NHL and he can win a playoff series on his own. The Caps were blanked by the superstar Swedish net minder twice this season. Washington must be willing, unlike last spring, to pay the physical price and get bodies to the net. In addition, they need to get the puck there. The Rangers are very good at blocking shots so Boudreau must direct his blueliners where to put the biscuit so it can make it to the cage then the Capitals must go there and score the ugly goals. A perimeter game is not going to get it done so it will be interesting to see if a guy like Semin will go into the higher traffic areas to take more advantage of his super skill set. Lundqvist has played nearly all of the Rangers games down the stretch and New York has no real back up goalie so anything Washington can do to get him off of his game is needed.

3. Limit turnovers – The Caps cannot turn the puck over from their offensive blue line on back. The Rangers, if they get a lead, will no doubt try and play a neutral zone trap and counter attack the Capitals. In addition, when tied or trailing, Tortorella’s crew will apply a vicious forecheck on Washington. The Caps centers will be the key to the break out as the Rangers will likely jam the walls. Nicklas Backstrom, Jason Arnott, and Marcus Johansson will be the ones who have to be in the proper position to burn New York’s pressure and use their skill and speed to get the Caps some odd man rushes in transition.

 4. Solid Goaltending – Michal Neuvirth, who is expected to the get the game one start, and Semyon Varlamov, if he plays, must be on their respective games from the outset of this series. In game one of the past two post season openers Jose Theodore allowed some questionable goals to put Washington behind the eight ball early against the Rangers in 2009 and the Habs in 2010. #30 and #1 can’t do that and they also must be positionally sound to prevent allowing rebounds to a Rangers team that is offensively challenged and tries to compensate for that by going to the net hard.

5. Win the Special Teams Battle – The first thing the Caps need to do is be disciplined and not take retaliation penalties against a team that will try and goad you into those type of infractions. Sean Avery is the Rangers number one pest and he will do his best to get Washington off of their game. In addition, the best way to stay out of the box is to work hard and move your feet. Penalties happen from laziness and the Capitals can’t afford to put the Rangers on the man advantage. The Caps have improved their PK this year but the best way to do well in the playoffs is to not take many penalties. On the power play, the Caps showed signs of breaking out of their season long slump with the man advantage. The power play must continue to be simplified with pucks coming from the point with traffic in front. The Caps like to employ forwards on the points, at times, so Oveckhin, Brooks Laich and any other forward put back there must remember to be responsible. Shorthanded goals in the playoffs can really change momentum in a game and series so it is imperative that Boudreau’s crew not allow any.

6. Maintain Their Focus & Play It One Shift At a Time – A series is not won in a single game. The Caps, if they get ahead in the series, can’t get complacent or start looking ahead. On the flip side, if they get behind they can’t panic and stop playing their system. That is what happened in the two blow out losses to New York in the regular season. Given that Washington had a 10 minute lapse to start game five last year that likely cost them the Montreal series, I don’t think we’ll see that this year, but that is easier said than done. The first round is the hardest one to get out of and teams that have success don’t get too high or too low. They stick to their system and play it one shift at a time. The Caps must learn to do that this post season.

In summary, this series is going to come down to hard work and determination. The Rangers definitely bring that and for the Caps to win they need to match or beat New York’s intensity and desire. Washington is the more skilled team but playoff hockey is a different animal where many contests are of the one goal variety. The Capitals played over 40 one goal games this season and as a result should be more battle tested. New York is a club that never quits and proof of that is the way they made the playoffs on the last day of the season as well as their 5-3 victory over the Boston Bruins on Monday night after trailing 3-0. Coach Tortorella’s crew believes in themselves and the only way to beat a team like that is to out work them. If the Caps don’t do that this post season, then there is no doubt that there will be changes in Washington.

Caps News

For those who missed it, Caps Coach Bruce Boudreau was on TSN’s Off the Record with Michael Landsberg last week and the biggest news out of the interview, which ranged from the steroid allegations against the Caps to the overblown topic (and I thought dead) of Alexander Ovechkin’s 50th goal celebration in Tampa, was that Washington defenseman Mike Green is believed to have mononucleosis. Thus the so-called “flu” we heard as a reason for #52′s subpar play early in the playoffs is apparently more serious. And given that Green re-injured his shoulder in the Rangers series it is likely that the lack of energy he was feeling from that illness helped contribute to the shoulder situation. What is the bottom line in all of this? Green, who is only 23 years old, needs to take better care of himself in the future.

Another interesting thing in that interview was Landsberg mentioned that Viktor Kozlov and Sergei Fedorov were signed to play in the Russian Kontinental Hockey League next season, meaning they will no longer be Capitals. Boudreau didn’t contest the statement nor react to it indicating either the pair is definitely gone next season or he is just leaving that issue for General Manager George McPhee (who is in charge of team personnel) to handle.

Last bit of Caps news before moving on to discuss the Calder Cup, here is a link for the latest update on the steroid allegations that were made by Richard Thomas against Washington last week: http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/news/story?id=4220886

Bears News

The Hershey Bears went into a sold out (15,003) arena in Winnipeg last Saturday night and stunned the Manitoba Moose, 5-4, in overtime in Game 1 of the Calder Cup Finals. Alexandre Giroux had a hat trick, including the game winner, and continues to show why he was the MVP of the American Hockey League (AHL) this past season. Game 2 is on Tuesday night at 830pm. You can watch it live on the internet via http://www.theahl.com/ for only $8. Games 3 through 5 are in Hershey on Saturday, Sunday, and then next Tuesday.

In game 1, the Bears took too many penalties giving the Moose 10 power plays to only 5 for Hershey. In addition, Manitoba’s Matt Pope had a penalty shot 14:14 into the second period with the Moose up 3-1, but Hershey rookie goalie Michael Neuvirth came up big with the save. Manitoba also had a two minute 5 on 3 power play in the final minutes of regulation but could not score. Neuvirth made 26 saves on 30 shots but two of the goals he gave up were on breakaways. Oskar Osala, who has NHL potential, had the other two goals for the Bears.

If you haven’t yet seen the incredibly exciting highlights from game 1 click here: http://ahl.neulion.com/team/console.jsp?catid=2&id=2242

Stanley Cup Finals Analysis

The Detroit Red Wings held serve at home this past weekend to take a 2-0 lead in the Stanley Cup Finals with game 3 scheduled for Tuesday night in Pittsburgh. Much was made, especially by Detroit, of the schedule change that moved the series up for NBC and had the two teams playing on back to back nights in prime time. Many people felt that favored the younger Penguins but the defending Stanley Cup Champions persevered.

Defenseman Nicklas Lidstrom returned from a lower body injury and helped to hold Penguins star Sidney Crosby scoreless through the first two games. #87 has been as good as you can be without scoring a point and he had five shots on net in the loss on Sunday night. Crosby has been all over the ice and Wings goalie Chris Osgood, who is a big reason why this series is in favor of Detroit so far, has robbed the superstar on several occasions. Crosby also set up winger Bill Guerin for some “layups” yet #13 has either hit the post or been denied by Osgood.

For some strange reason Penguins Coach Dan Bylsma decided to go back to dressing 12 forwards on Sunday night (he had been going with just 11 since early in the Caps series) inserting the supersoft Pascal Dupuis, who’s turnover to Marian Hossa led to Detroit’s go ahead goal, instead of giving extra ice time to Crosby and Evgeni Malkin (who has been flying around the rink as well). Dupuis tried to blame Hossa for breaking his stick on the play and wanted a penalty. I still haven’t seen where Hossa broke #9′s stick, in fact, it looked to me like Dupuis broke it on Hossa. Regardless of that, if Dupuis was stronger and had more heart he gets the puck out of the zone before his stick breaks. He belongs in the press box, if you ask me.

Crosby and Malkin seem to be the only guys who have really shown up for Pittsburgh and goalie Marc Andre-Fleury displayed in both games that he is definitely the weak link on that team. The goal he gave up off of the backboards in game 1 to Brad Stuart was horrible and the two goals he has given up to Justin Abdelkader (Red Wings 2nd round pick, 42nd overall in 2005 NHL Entry draft) were soft ones. Abdelkader only played two regular season games with Detroit this year as he spent most of his time in the AHL for Grand Rapids (Wings farm team). Detroit’s depth has been another reason they are up two games to none since they have had to play without Hart trophy finalist, Pavel Datsyuk, in those contests.

I still think the Penguins can get back in the series because they have dominated portions of the first two games. However, goaltending and experience (players and coaching) seem to be decidedly in Detroit’s favor. I do expect the Pens to win game three but if they don’t it is time to start the engraving process for the Red Wings and plan the Cup parade and parties.

Finally, a good piece here ( http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/blog/puck_daddy/post/Malkin-Non-Suspension-The-embarrassment-continu?urn=nhl,167172 ) by Puck Daddy’s Greg Wyshynski on the instigator rule and the various ways it has been interpreted since enacted by the NHL head shed in New York.

NHL News

Wild news out of Montreal today as current Florida GM Jacques Martin, who had four more years left on his contract as Panthers GM, stepped down to become head coach of the Canadiens. I have criticized Martin’s poor managing ability in this blog before and you combine that with the word that the Panthers owners are looking to sell the team and you see why the former Ottawa Senators coach wants to get back behind the bench. Martin is a good coach but he has his work cut out for him in one of the toughest cities to work in pro sports.

Former NHL star Joe Nieuwendyk has been named GM of the Dallas Stars since owner Tom Hicks, as I mentioned in this blog before, is holding former co-GM’s Les Jackson and Brett Hull accountable for the Sean Avery debacle. Jackson is going back to scouting and pro player personnel while Hull is being moved to an executive VP position and out of personnel management. This seems like a smart move by a man who sources have told me doesn’t mind spending money but does not like to waste it (and that is exactly what happened in the Avery debacle).

Additional Caps Advance to Second Round Coverage

As promised last night, there is more to tell after Tuesday’s huge Caps win over the New York Rangers in game seven, a series in which the Caps trailed two games to none and then three games to one, yet still prevailed.

How big was this series win for this franchise?

“It’s huge. We worked so hard this year to get where we are now and to be put back in the same position we were last year [losing in the first round] is not a good building block for us. To get this win and move on to the second round now we are more experienced in that aspect and hopefully we can go as long as we can here but we are definitely more experienced than we were last year,” said Caps defensemen Mike Green (1 goal, 4 assists in round one).

“It’s awesome, it’s a great feeling, we are excited about the next round. You never want to lose, especially in a long series like this coming back and fighting. You never want to feel what we felt last year.,” said Tom Poti, who was one of the stars of this playoff series with two goals, four assists, and was +2.

The key point from the above quotes is the Caps, after a 108 point season, improved on last year’s first round exit. Had they lost this series, GM George McPhee, who was quoted afterwards as saying “we had to win,” would have to give some consideration to the thought that maybe this mostly very young team was better assembled for the regular season given it’s high skill level but lack of playoff results. This is a common thing for a GM to do after multiple frustrating post season losses and you need to look no further than the President’s Trophy winning San Jose Sharks for an example of that happening now.

“The frustration is overwhelming. We owe an apology to our fans and our ownership. … Everything will be evaluated. There’s nothing that’s off the table. This is going to be a tough, painful summer, and it should be,” said Sharks GM Doug Wilson after his team, that led the NHL with 117 regular season points, lost in six games in the first round to the eighth seeded Anaheim Ducks. Wilson, who added Cup winning defensemen Dan Boyle and Rob Blake last off-season plus fired Coach Ron Wilson for not getting past the second round on several tries (he hired former Wings assistant Brian McLellan to take over behind the bench), may have to make some major moves that could include trading superstar Joe Thornton, who has been heavily labeled as a guy who can’t win in the playoffs.

With Alexander Semin and Nicklas Backstrom both just one year away from unrestricted free agency who is to say that a loss this year to the Rangers might have pushed McPhee into a Wilson-like mode? Fortunately for Washington, that scenario appears to be out the window heading into the Pittsburgh series given the Caps ability to have some postseason success.

Coaching played a big role in the Caps series win and the two biggest moves that made a difference, in my opinion, go to Caps Coach Bruce Boudreau. First, he yanked Jose Theodore and inserted rookie goalie Simeon Varlamov after just one game. The young goalie only gave up 8 goals in six games and two of those were in garbage time in game six. The players certainly enjoyed having solid goaltending they could count on.

“He’s a great young goaltender and he’s been the difference in this series. Stepping in and playing the way he has has changed the atmosphere on our team. We are very confident with him in the net. For him to come in and play consistently the way he has every game is great. Not many goalies can play as consistent as that every game. It is incredible at his age,” said Green giving #40 a ringing endorsement as the Caps starting goalie.

Then with the 2nd overall ranked power play in the NHL struggling in games four and five (it went 0 for 13) the crafty coach moved Oveckhin down low (a move he did successfully against the Flyers last season) and inserted Tom Poti on the point opposite Mike Green. After that move the Caps were 2 for 4 on their power plays but it could have easily been 4 for 4 if not for Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist as Washington had the puck in New York’s end nearly the entire time on both attempts in game seven after going 2 for 2 in game six. I asked both Poti and Green if moving Ovechkin down low changed things and opened things up for them.

“Maybe. It is always fun to play on the power play. Haven’t been on it much the last two years but it is nice to get out there and kind of shake things up a little bit, it helped us win the series, I think. We had some nice chances to score but Lundqvist came up big and kept it tied,” said Poti.

“Yeah, Tom is a left handed pass and he can move it to me a little bit better and I can go back and forth with him and we can create and allow the guys to move around down low alot and tire [the penalty killers] out. Alex [Ovechkin] and Alex [Semin] down low, Alex [Ovechkin] in the slot. He’s a big guy and you see that last game in New York he gets a tip on the puck, he’s got great hand-eye coordination so that was a great adjustment that Bruce did there,” finished Green.

Final thought on the series, it will be nice get away from the over dramatic New York Rangers and my least favorite player in the NHL, Sean Avery. Avery has the potential to be  a very good player but he gets too emotional and crosses the line too much. When #16 plays like he did in game seven he is great for his team but Washington did a good job of not letting his antics get to them.

“Just look the other way. I think that frustrates him the most. Just skate away and don’t play into his own games,” was how Poti described Washington’s plan on playing the pesky and controversial forward.

By the way, Avery did cause some trouble in game seven but it was to broadcaster Ray Ferraro, who was at ice level between the two benches for live reports. Avery, after a first period shift in which he was trying to goad the Washington players into taking a penalty, stormed back to his bench but let his stick fly in the air, seemingly out of control, and it struck Ferraro and the former Whaler and Islander had to grab it and yank it off of him. Ferraro then yelled something to Avery and the loose cannon forward leaned up and said something back to the guy who killed the Caps in overtime back in the 1993 playoffs. I asked Ferraro afterwards where the stick hit him but he declined comment not wanting to be part of the Caps-Rangers story.

Next up are the Penguins and there will be extensive media coverage locally and in the US and Canada. These teams respect but clearly don’t like each other. Boudreau’s “Welcome to the Circus” quote from Tuesday night, when he learned the Penguins would be Washington’s round two opponent, appears to be foreshadowing for the next two weeks.

If you’d like to hear my WNST on-air segment from today with Comcast Morning Show host Drew Forrester, please go to the WNST audio vault (http://wnst.net/wordpress/section/audio/).

Ovechkin Named Hart Trophy Finalist

No surprise here, Ovechkin, who won the Hart Trophy as the league’s MVP last season when he scored 65 goals, is once again nominated for that trophy. The Great #8 is a finalist with two other Russians, Evgeni Malkin of Pittsburgh and Pavel Datsyuk of Detroit.

Members of the Professional Hockey Writers’ Association submitted ballots for the Hart Trophy at the conclusion of the regular season, with the top three vote-getters announced as finalists. The winner will be announced Thursday, June 18, during the 2009 NHL Awards that will be broadcast live from the Pearl Concert Theater inside the Palms Hotel Las Vegas on VERSUS in the United States and on CBC in Canada. The Capitals are assured of at least two candidates for honors at the show, as Green is a finalist for the Norris Trophy as the league’s top defenseman.

Ovechkin could become the first player to win back-to-back Hart Trophies since Dominik Hasek in 1996-97 and ’97-98. The last non-goaltender to win consecutive Hart Trophies was Wayne Gretzky, who won eight in a row from 1980-87.

“It means a lot to me to be up for this award,” Ovechkin said. “I always want to be the best, so this is a great honor. It’s special, too, with three Russians nominated. It is a great thing for our country and our sport.”

Ovechkin led the NHL in goals (56), earning the Maurice “Rocket” Richard Trophy for the second consecutive season. He also led the league in points per game (1.39), shots (528) and power-play points (46). His 110 points in 79 games ranked second in the league, and his goal total was 10 more than any other player. He finished the season recording eight more points than any other player after the NHL All-Star Game (51; Malkin and Sidney Crosby of Pittsburgh were second with 43 each).

Western Conference Semi-Finals Matchups, Analysis, and Predictions

The NHL is in a great position now as there are 8 teams left in the playoffs and in my mind, any of them can win the Stanley Cup this June. In the East you have Boston vs. Carolina and “The Circus” while out west you have the last two Stanley Cup Champions playing each other in Detroit (2008) vs. Anaheim (2007) and up and coming Chicago vs. Vancouver (who have the best goalie in the league in Roberto Luongo according to Yahoo’s puck daddy, Greg Wyshynski).

Tonight, I’ll preview the West:

(2) Detroit vs. (8) Anaheim

Even though I picked the Sharks to beat the Ducks, I wrote back in my first round preview that I thought the Sharks had the worst draw of the top four seeds. Anaheim has a great defense with Scott Niedermayer, Chris Pronger, Ryan Whitney, Jim Wisniewski, and Francois Beauchemin (returned from injury in round one). Rookie Bobby Ryan, the number two overall pick to Crosby in the 2005 NHL Entry draft, is tearing it up on a line with Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry. In net, Jonas Hiller has been superb and the Ducks also have seasoned Cup winning vets in Teemu Selanne and Rob Niedermayer. You want goaltending depth, Stanley Cup winning goalie J.S Giguere is currently operating the bench door and will continue to do so unless Hiller struggles. Talk about a good insurance policy in net.

On the other hand, the Detroit Red Wings are a big red machine (sorry 1975/76 Cincinnati Reds!). On the back line they have six time Norris Trophy winner Nicklas Lidstrom with Brian Rafalksi, Brad Stuart, and Nicklas Kronwall and up front they have Datsyuk, Henrik Zetterberg, Marian Hossa, Johan Franzen, and the best goalie screener in the business in Tomas Holmstrom. The only possible shaky area is goalie with an aging Chris Osgood, but “Ozzie” has won two Stanley Cups as starting goaltender, including last season.

The Red Wings are great at controlling the puck while the Ducks like to be physical and play the cycle game. This will be one outstanding series but I’ve been on the Wings bandwagon all year so I am not jumping off now. Detroit in seven games.

(3) Vancouver Canucks vs. (4) Chicago Blackhawks

Luongo, the Canucks captain, is the whole key to this team. He is so big and takes up so much net that you have to get him out of position or screen him like crazy to score on him. Because of the outstanding goaltending in Vancouver, the Canucks can take a few more chances offensively with the Sedins (Daniel and Henrik), Pavel Demitra, Ryan Kessler, Alex Burrows, and Mats Sundin (added as a free agent midway through the season). Vancouver’s defense is anchored by the powerful and fiery Willie Mitchell but it also boasts solid two way man Mattias Ohlund plus Sami Salo, Alexander Edler, and Kevin Bieksa. The Canucks had alot of injuries during the season (Luongo missed six weeks plus with a groin injury and the defense had numerous man games lost) but came together and blew by a really banged up Calgary team down the stretch erasing what was a 13 point Flames lead in the Northwest Division in January.

Chicago is a highly skilled team like the Caps. Their captain, Jonathan Toews (pronounced Taze [like faze and daze]), is such a good two way player that goes to the net and gets ugly goals to go with some highlight reel ones as well (who can forget the Carrie Milbank/Eddie Olczyk NHL.com commercial?). Patrick Kane, who missed a game against Calgary due to the flu, is all speed and skill and you add in Patrick Sharp, rookie Kris Versteeg, Martin Havlat, plus big #33 Dennis Byfuglien who is effective when he goes hard to the net and that adds up to some serious offensive firepower. On the backline the Hawks have puck mover Brian Campbell who played well against the Flames plus Brent Seabrook (really stepped up against Calgary), Cam Barker, and Duncan Keith. It is not a real physical defense but it has been effective. In goal soon to be free agent Nikolai Khabibulin has been so good that Hawks Coach Joel Quennville has kept former Canadiens and Caps goalie Cristobal Huet on the bench (an expensive backup at over $5M a season for four years).

To me the key for the Canucks is to dump the puck in and hit the Chicago defense. Vancouver has a good cycle game and will need to generate scoring opportunities from that. Chicago has offense but they will now face Luongo and it will be tough to score. They had trouble against St. Louis scoring but Chris Mason gave up some bad goals for the Blues to allow the Canucks to sweep. This is a hard one to pick but I’m going with a well rested Vancouver team in seven games.

Well, that is it for tonight. If you’ve read this far you are a true hockey fan and I thank you. On Thursday night look for some coverage of the Caps-Pens series as I head out to Kettler Ice Plex to catch up with the Capitals after their practice.

For 40 minutes on Tuesday night in game 7 at the Verizon Center it looked like the New York Rangers wanted this game and playoff series more than the Washington Capitals. However, thanks to some great goaltending by rookie Simeon Varlamov (who just turned 21 on Monday the 27th), some lucky bounces that resulted in Alexander Semin’s game tying goal in the first period, a very spirited third period by the Caps that saw them out shoot the Rangers 13-1, and then a Hall of Fame wrist shot, short side, upstairs by Sergei Fedorov past outstanding Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist with just 4:59 left in the game the Caps are moving on to the second round to face the Pittsburgh Penguins after a 2-1 victory. Fedorov, who turned 39 back in December, had the following to say about the goal.

“It was just a regular break out. It was two-on-two in their zone. Not much else going on, so I decided to shoot the puck… I didn’t think too much about it. Entering the zone, make sure the puck went deep. The D[efense, Rangers Wade Redden] gave me some room, when I stopped so I choose to shoot. I knew the D[efense] was giving me short side. I guess Henrik went down and I shot it top shelf.”

This series win is the first ever for Caps owner Ted Leonsis, something that was news to Fedorov until I asked him if he and his teammates knew about it.

“Now we do. I guess it is great, he’s a great owner, he deserves to win. I feel even better that that happened. Ted deserves all of the credit in the world to bring this team together and we are just happy for him,” said the three time Stanley Cup Champion.

This game could have easily been 3-0 Rangers after the first period, if not for Varlamov, as the Rangers came out flying while the Caps looked lost. On the opening shift, Varlamov stopped a streaking Sean Avery, who had an outstanding game for the Rangers on Tuesday, and shortly thereaftet he robbed Nik Antropov with a pad save when #80 had a clear breakaway after taking a great pass from Michael Rozsival which split the Caps defense (John Erskine and Brian Pothier).  Later in the period he came up huge on a Derrick Morris point blast with Avery standing right in front of him.

“He is tremendously poised.  I still haven’t talked to him since game one.  I don’t want to screw him up, so I am leaving him alone.  With the way they were coming for the first two periods, for him to have the poise that he did was tremendous.  I don’t know what his stomach was doing but he seemed really calm out there,” said Boudreau on his rookie goaltender who only allowed just eight goals in six games, stopping 152 of 160 shots faced (.950) and recording a 1.34 GAA after replacing Jose Theodore after game one. Varlamov made 14 saves in game seven.

Washington did not register a single shot on goal until the 13th minute when they forced Lundqvist to make a save on a Caps power play. The Capitals goal, on their only other shot on net in the first period with 4:28 left, was a fluky one from Semin, who shot the puck right as a hustling and back checking Ryan Callahan came sliding in front of #28 and the biscuit ricocheted twice off of Callahan and then went by a down on the ground Lundqvist (22 saves on the night, some of which were nearly game saving in the third period), who was expecting a cleaner and harder shot. In the previous six game sevens that the Washington franchise has participated in they never have received as fortuitous a bounce as this one.

The Caps came back in this series from three games to one down to tie it up because they stuck to a simple game plan of dumping the puck behind the Rangers defensemen, then beating them to the puck, using Washington’s cycling game to wear out their defense, and generate scoring chances. Alexander Ovechkin’s quote after game six of “we play hard, we play simple” is what Caps Coach Bruce Boudreau has been stressing to his highly skilled team to be successful. Tonight the Rangers played the Caps style to near perfection for the first period and a good part of the second period but they lack the offensive ability to finish off many of the strong plays they would make on the boards and even though they dominated territorially, they only mustered 14 shots through two periods.

“For most of the game I thought we did a really good job of keeping the puck. It was probably the most we kept the puck all series. We couldn’t develop good scoring chances even with the puck and during the [third] period I think they turned it up a notch and we ended up backing up a little bit and they had the puck more than we did. It was still a game to be had. Who makes the next big play. They did, we didn’t. They win the game. I’m not frustrated with the team. I appreciate how hard they worked tonight. There were a lot of things during the past few weeks going on around this club and playing against a very good Washington Capitals team. That’s a good hockey team. I thought we checked our [butts] off tonight. We’re not an offensive juggernaut and that comes back and bites us. We’re just not developing enough offense. We knew we had to close down the neutral zone and we did that very well for two periods. But they amped it up, again we’re still in it, but they make a big play, we don’t get enough offense in the third period to get some scoring chances,” said Rangers Coach John Tortorella after the game.

In the third period it was all Caps as they were the ones playing the simple game and outworking the Rangers, who seemed to have expended all of their energy in the first two periods (throughout the entire third period during breaks in play I noticed several of the Rangers were hunched over and leaning on their sticks while the Caps were upright and appeared fresh).

“It’s just one of those things. That’s a great club over there. We stuck to our game plan and in the third we were right there, one shot a way. [The Capitals] did a great job; give them credit. In the third they took the play to us. It’s just one of those things. We still thought we had it though. Just one shot – that’s all we kept saying,” said Rangers forward Scott Gomez on the close game seven and New York’s approach.

“They played a great game. We had a little bit of trouble moving the puck out of our zone because their forwards are so fast and our D also seemed to be under pressure. After two periods we knew we had to get our work level up and our talent would eventually come out on top. We really simplified our game, actually, and our forwards had the puck ahead of them and forechecked really well on their defense. I think that is how we won in New York [in game six] and how we won in the third period,” said Fedorov.

Another big factor in this game was the Washington fans and the energy in the building, especially in the third period. When the Caps started playing better in that final stanza the crowd began getting into it more and the Washington players seemed to feed off of it. Then after the best video clip the Washington marketing crew offers at each home game was played on the big board (“Unleash the Fury”), the noise level kept rising and did not stop. I have NEVER been to a Capitals game where the crowd has been louder, it was unbelievable to be a part of, especially after the Fedorov goal where the fans kept cheering until the horn sounded.

“My ears are still ringing. It was loud. It was like going to a rock concert. It was awesome. It built up and built up. After that “unleash the fury” and after [Fedorov] scored the goal it didn’t quiet down,” said Captain Chris Clark who returned from a wrist injury to play his first NHL game since January.

“It was very loud, especially in the third. I think the fans felt that we were trying to make a push. We were trying to put the puck behind their D[efense] and forecheck as hard as we can. They were really cheering hard. They really want us to do well. They really wanted the victory. It was a great atmosphere. I’m sure any player that can play in an atmosphere like that would enjoy it and play hard. It was an amazing experience,” added Fedorov.

“I don’t know what Chicago is like as far as building, other than the National Anthem, but that was the loudest five minutes after we scored.  They never sat down, they never stopped cheering.  If you look at the energy we had just in checking; the people brought that out of us.  They wouldn’t let us not continue skating, not continue anything, it was really a thing to watch,” finished Boudreau on the crowd. It should be noted that because of Washington’s great fan aided forecheck, the Rangers were not able to pull Lundqvist for an extra attacker in the closing minute.

That is it for tonight but please check back late Wednesday night when I bring you some more analysis of the game and series win plus more quotes from the players and coaches (Mike Green and Tom Poti provided some good insight on the improved, since game six, Washington power play).  On Thursday I’ll preview the Penguins series and provide my second round predictions (btw, I went 7 for 8 in round one, with the only loss being President’s Trohy winning San Jose’s six game defeat to Anaheim). The complete playoff schedule with the Penguins has been announced and it is as follows:

Saturday, May 2nd at Washington (1pm on NBC)

Monday, May 4th at Washington (7pm on Versus)

Wednesday, May 6th at Pittsburgh (7pm on Versus)

Friday, May 8th at Pittsburgh (7pm on Versus)

*Saturday, May 9th at Washington (7pm on Versus)

*Monday, May 11th at Pittsburgh (TBD on Versus)

*Wednesday, May 13th at Washington (7pm on Versus)

* – if necessary

Crank up Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’”, the Washington Capitals have overcome the odds and forced a game seven on Tuesday night with a 5-3 victory over the New York Rangers at Madison Square Garden this afternoon. Last season the Caps forced a game seven against the Philadelphia Flyers after being down three games to one and lost in overtime. Can the Capitals, who have waited a year to avenge that game seven loss, pull off the feat this year and give Caps owner Ted Leonsis his first ever playoff series win? If they play like they did in the first two periods of today’s game they should be able to do it as they chased Rangers goalie, Henrik Lundqvist, to the bench after 40 minutes for the second straight game. The Rangers added two goals in the last period, including one with five seconds left to make the score look closer but credit New York for not quitting and with some help from the referees they may have grabbed some momentum those last 20 minutes, however, the Caps clearly quit skating for the majority of that stanza.

This contest had a crazy twist coming in to it with Rangers Coach John Tortorella suspended for the game for squirting water at a fan to start an altercation and then he hit a woman on the head when he threw a water bottle into the stands with 6:33 left in game five. Prior to that game Tortorella, ironically, had preached discipline and composure to his team and had scratched pesky forward Sean Avery in game five for taking some bad penalties in the third period of game four. Avery dressed for game six and former Caps Coach Jim Schoenfeld was behind the bench as Rangers interim coach replacing the former Stanley Cup winning coach (Tortorella, who won the Stanley Cup with Tampa in 2004, will be back for game seven).

Washington’s defense was the key today as they produced the first three Caps goals, all in the first period. The first was triggered by game five hero Matt Bradley, who forced an offensive zone turnover with some great forechecking and Brooks Laich and Dave Steckel then set up Milan Jurcina for a blast that beat Lundqvist short side to give the guys in white a 1-0 lead. The Rangers then struck back on a power play goal by Scott Gomez, their first in 19 attempts, to tie it up and for the next couple of minutes the game was looking like it could go either way when Washington received a power play after Paul Mara held Laich.

Washington’s power play had gone ZERO for 13 in games four and five but the Caps finally received a good bounce as Alexander Semin’s shot ricocheted right off of a Rangers skate to Mike Green in the right circle and he roofed it over Lundqvist for his first goal of the playoffs to ignite the Caps. Green apparently has been battling the flu bug and before the game he told NBC’s Pierre McGuire that he was finally getting his energy level back. The Rangers then had another power play chance when Tom Poti put the puck over the glass for a delay of game penalty but Washington killed the infraction thanks to some good goaltending from Simeon Varlamov (29 saves). When Poti came out of the box he, Dave Steckel, and Boyd Gordon had a three on one because Mark Staal pinched in the offensive zone and the three Caps passed the puck beautifully around Joe Girardi setting up Poti to stuff the puck over Lundqvist for a 3-1 Caps lead.

In the second period the Caps dominated play by possessing the puck for long stretches of time but with just over nine mintues gone the game’s deciding point came as the Rangers Nikolai Zherdev missed a partially open net that would have made it 3-2 and Washington took the puck down the other way in transition. Viktor Kozlov then abused Staal with a great move and put the puck upstairs past Lundqvist to make it 4-1. Then the Great #8 sealed the deal by deflecting a Poti point pass/shot under Lundqvist with just 3:16 left in the period on the power play. That made it 5-1 and the Caps power play was a perfect 2 for 2 on the afternoon. At that point Washington seemed to not want to take any chances and just get ready for game seven.

Here are some other thoughts on the game:

The Caps power play did get a lucky bounce on the first goal but Caps Coach Bruce Boudreau switched things up a bit putting Poti on the point with Green and moving Ovechkin down low several times and that opened things up for Washington’s defense to shoot and create.

Poti, one goal and three assists, was outstanding today and hopefully his creaky groin is okay for game seven. He may have tweaked it late in the contest.

Washington clearly was trying to beat Lundqvist high glove side and they were successful doing that today. Because of the size of Lundqvist’s pads he is tough to beat on the ice unless you get him moving. The question now is can Washington find a way to force King Henrik into a third straight bad game? Lundqvist has never lost a first round playoff series.

Varlamov was a little shaky in the first period giving up some rebounds but he takes up a lot of net and was very solid when he had to be. He could not be faulted on any of the three New York goals (the Rangers second tally was on a 5 on 3 power play after John Erskine was incorrectly, in my opinion as well as Mike Emrick’s (NBC play by play man), called for a holding penalty on Nik Andropov on a clean check).

Washington took four penalties in the third period and faced two lengthy 5 on 3′s, including one with just over five minutes left and the game still 5-2 but Dave Steckel, Laich, and Poti were outstanding killing it by winning a defensive zone face-off and then ragged alot of time off the clock before firing the puck down the ice.

The Caps did not turn the puck over at the Rangers blue line and did a good job of dumping it deep behind the New York defensemen. If they continue to do this in game seven they will have success. They need to avoid blind passes/careless backpasses that could give the Rangers the ability to get their good transition game going. Today it was Washington’s transition game that was superior.

New York has trouble scoring, they have only 10 goals in this series, so the Caps can’t take penalties, such as Brashear’s late hit on Blair Betts today, that give the Rangers an advantage. Washington is superior at five on five and the only reason this thing is tied up is because of Lundqvist and a bad first game in goal by Washington’s Jose Theodore.

I’m sure the Verizon Center will be raring and ready to go on Tuesday night. The Caps have not come back from 3-1 down to win a series since 1988 against the Philadelphia Flyers. It is time for the guys in red on Tuesday to win one for their owner and for themselves. This will be one tough game and you can bet the Rangers will be ready.

If the Washington Capitals somehow find a way to pull out this best of seven series after trailing three games to one against the New York Rangers then Matt Bradley’s shorthanded goal to put the Caps up 1-0 tonight will be forever remembered as the turning point in this series. Bradley then scored another goal just over seven minutes later from a bad angle on the seemingly invincible Henrik Lundqvist to give the Caps a 2-0 lead and they never looked back in a 4-0 dominating win at the sold out Verizon Center in game five. Game six is Sunday afternoon in Madison Square Garden at 2pm on NBC and once again a Rangers win eliminates the Caps. Friday night though, was about Bradley and his two goals.

“It’s not every game Brad[ley] scores. I was real happy for him. He works so hard…He’s an unsung hero. Whether he plays four minutes or seven, he’s a still a component in the room and when he can get rewarded like that that’s great,” said Caps Coach Bruce Boudreau.

Bradley’s second goal stunned not only him but Lundqvist.

“Brooks [Laich] made a great play… I’m not going to lie. I was just throwing it at the net and luckily it went in. You don’t get many of those against a great goalie like that,” said Bradley.

“I made a bad decision and tried to stand up and cover the five-hole but my pads are not built like that to cover that well so I have to go down on one knee, but I didn’t.  I thought it would be good enough to stand up like that but it went through…it was a bad decision.  That’s on me, that goal.  No question…I don’t know if we can learn so much from this game, we just have to move on and get ready for next time,” said Lundqvist, who had held the Caps to just eight goals on 149 shots in the first four games of this series. On Friday he gave up four goals on 14 shots and he would sit out the third period (replaced by backup goalie Steve Valiquette) to rest for game six and the Caps expect King Henrik to be back on Sunday.

“Every great goalie every now and then makes a mistake. The thing that worried me about that was when I saw it go in, I said ‘ Oh, he’s going to be great the next game.’ Usually they bounce right back so I anticipate him being great on Sunday,” said Boudreau on Lundqvist.

“I’m sure he’ll [Henrik Lundqvist] will bounce back and have a great game on Sunday,” added Bradley on Lundqvist.

Alexander Semin scored the Caps third goal off of a Nicklas Backstrom face-off win and then Alexander Ovechkin had a highlight reel goal to make it 4-0 with 29 seconds left in the second period. Ovechkin went through two Rangers (Chris Drury and Derrick Morris) and while falling to the ice slid the puck under Lundqvist’s pads on the backhand for his second goal of the series. Ovechkin downplayed the goal calling it “a lucky shot” and mentioned that he is “terrible on his backhand.” Lucky or not, the goal was incredible and if Ovechkin can work on his backhand shot in the off-season and have the ability to go around defenseman either on the forehand or backhand there is no limit to the number of goals he could score in a season. But to improve his backhand the Great #8 would likely have to decrease the amount of curve he puts on his stick. Alexander the Great now has six points (2g-4a) in five games in these playoffs.

Back to game five, the Caps got some very good goaltending from rookie Simeon Varlamov who made 20 saves, including a great one on Brandon Dubinsky with 3:10 left in the first period when the game was still in doubt. Boudreau was asked about Varlamov and if he is giving him any advice.

“I’m just going to keep letting him go. I don’t want to get into his head. I don’t want to talk to him,” said Boudreau. Varlamov recorded his second career playoff shutout,and he has now stopped 95 of 98 shots for a 0.76 GAA and .969 save percentage. He is the third Capitals goalie to record multiple shutouts in their playoff career (Olie Kolzig and Don Beaupre) and the second goalie to record multiple shutouts in the same playoff season (Olie Kolzig, 1998, four shutouts).

For Washington, one of the problem areas going forward is still the power play, which was better as the game went on with Laich being put in front of the net on the first unit, but it still did not convert going 0 for 7 and is now 0 for 13 in the last two games. Granted Boudreau did not use Ovechkin, Semin, and some of the other top players on the late man advantages (Ovie did not play the last 8 plus minutes at all) but the Caps will need to start making the Rangers pay for some of the silly penalties they are taking if they want to win this series. Rangers Coach John Tortorella certainly recognized that his team’s play in that area was a key for his team.

“We got enough practice tonight with it, didn’t we?  And that is what is keeping us above water right now.” said Tortorella on his penalty killing unit.

Having watched all five games in this series it is pretty clear that the Rangers strategy is to force the Caps into turnovers in the neutral zone or at the Rangers blue line. With Washington being a highly skilled team they have a tendency to always want to carry the puck into the Rangers zone and New York has used that to their advantage in their wins by intercepting errant cross ice passes and going the other way in transition. The Caps need to do what they did best in games three and five, and that was to get the puck in deep in the Rangers zone and outwork the New York defense. Mike Green (1 assist in 25:09 of ice time) talked about getting the puck in behind the Rangers defense on NHL Live on Thursday and when the Caps have done that in this series they have had success.

“That’s what all teams try to do because once you take the puck in you can make some plays and do some damage. So we’ve just been trying to get it deep and outwork them. It’s the same philosophy every team has, try and get it deep and wear down the D,” said Caps defenseman Tom Poti on the Rangers stacking the blueline against them and Washington’s approach to the game.

In game three many of Washington’s goals came when they worked the puck from behind the net out and that made it tough for Lundqvist to know where the shots were coming from. So I asked Poti if the secret in game six will be for the Caps to simplify their game and dump the puck behind the Rangers goal line and pound New York’s defense.

“I think so, we are going to try and come out and have the same effort we had tonight and if we do so we’ll be okay,” finished Poti.

The Caps also have to be careful not to blindly throw the puck out into the slot with two Caps behind the net as the Rangers are collapsing their players into that area and are waiting to go in transition. On Washington’s breakout from their zone New York is jamming the boards so the Caps did a good job of chipping it up the center of the ice to a forward or hard off the boards around the Rangers defense. Minimizing mistakes and winning the little battles will be the key to a  Caps victory on Sunday and would prevent Lundqvist from single handily deciding the series.

“After you play a team for five games, you know what to expect out of them. It’s just a matter of winning the one-on-one battles and competing. That’s the only way to win games,” finished Caps defenseman Brian Pothier.

Notes: The final shots on goal were 21-20 for Washington, the lowest combined total in the series. The Caps won the face-off battle 28-21. John Erskine had another strong game on defense and was +3 in 17:07 of ice time. Sean Avery, who has taken several bad penalties in this series, was scratched but with New York losing you can expect him back for game six. Chris Drury was -3 in 7:21 of ice time for the Rangers. The game got chippy at times tonight and the Rangers were taking some runs at Washington in the third period. I asked Ovechkin if he thought this game was more physical than the others and he said “every game has been just as physical.”

A very determined Washington Capitals team came out and put “a good ole fashioned spanking,” as Rangers Coach John Tortorella called it afterwards, on New York on Monday night in a 4-0 victory that cut the Blueshirts playoff series lead to two games to one. Game 4 is Wednesday night at 7pm at Madison Square Garden (Note: Please come out to the Silver Spring Mining Company in Hunt Valley for another WNST Rock the Red party on Wednesday.)

Rookie Simeon Varlamov was great in goal for the Caps stopping 33 shots and getting help from the post on the one occasion when he really needed it en route to his first career shutout and playoff victory. Varlamov was exceptional and the Caps defense was outstanding as well as Washington blocked 13 shots (the same number as the Rangers on this night) and did not allow the Rangers room in front of the net. Defensemen John Erskine and Brian Pothier had arguably the best games they have played all season.

On the offensive side of the ice, Washington went to the front of the goal with much more vigor and it resulted in four tallies on 40 shots on Henrik Lundqvist. Alexander Semin, who struggled in game two, was my number one star of the night (with Varly a close second) as he scored the first two goals and set up the third one by Brooks Laich. #28 was superb all evening and he had eight shots on goal, two takeaways, no giveaways, no penalties, and was a +2.

The Great #8 had another very good game, despite not scoring a goal with five shots and five others that also missed the net, but he had two assists and made a couple of great defensive plays, including incredible hustle and a great poke check on what looked to be a shorthanded breakaway by Lauri Korpikoski. Ovechkin still could not get the puck by Lundqvist but you have to think that with all of the chances he is generating it is just a matter of time before he breaks through.

Lots of guys were very good for Washington tonight including Nicklas Backstrom (three assists), who made a great play on the boards to get the puck to Ovechkin, who then fed Semin for the Caps second goal. That tally came right after the Rangers thought they had tied the contest up at one but Ryan Callahan hit the post with a wide open net allowing the Caps to go the other way and get the 2-0 lead. Backstrom’s pass at the end of the game to set up Tom Poti’s fourth goal was one of the best I’ve ever seen and the young Swede also went 8-6 on face-offs.

Here are some other thoughts on the game:

The NHL is supposedly cracking down on so-called “message” shots late in playoff games when the contests are decided. If that is the case, then the Sean Avery punch to Simeon Varlamov’s head with 2:48 left certainly warrants a one game suspension. Avery, who played well in games one and two, was a head case tonight taking four penalties, two of which were boneheaded plays (the punch on Erskine and then the one on Varly), and Tortorella can’t be happy with that. Personally, I think Avery is a detriment to the league and when he does some of the dumb stuff he did tonight he not only hurts his hockey team but he hurts the NHL. I fully expect Colin Campbell to suspend Avery for Game 4, the league can’t have mental cases punching rookie goalies when the outcome of the contest is decided. Boudreau commented on Avery and his punch on Varlamov, who doesn’t speak english. “He is trying to stir it up but he is trying to do that with a guy who doesn’t understand what he is saying,” said Boudreau. Erskine also did a good job of not retaliating on Avery and Boudreau added, “The bench jumped up and patted John on the back.”

Tortorella was clearly upset after the contest and he summed this one up pretty simply. “I thought they played very well defensively and I thought we stunk defensively,” said the 2004 Stanley Cup winning coach. When asked about all of the penalties the Rangers were called for the savvy coach took a backhanded swipe at officials Dave Jackson and Kelly Sutherland. “Penalties were called, I’m not sure what they were, that really wasn’t an indicator of how we played, we simply stunk, period,” finished Tortorella, who then left the interview room.

Special Teams totals for Game 3: Caps 2 for 6 on the power play; Rangers 0 for 6. The Caps did a better job on the power play although it still did not look fluid at times but the ice at Madison Square Garden looked bad, just like it was at the Verizon Center on Saturday. Washington went to the net much more often and it paid off with Laich’s tally (#21 is the one Caps constant in front of the opposing goalie).

Tomas Fleischmann had a few quality scoring chances tonight and he was robbed by Lundqvist in the second period with the game 2-0, and then later in the period he had a golden opportunity in front on the power play and missed the net. #14 has got to start burying some of these chances.

In summary, this was an effort that Washington needed big time and they are now back in this best of seven game series. But if they don’t play with the same energy, grit, and passion in game four they will be right back in trouble. The Rangers will likely play much better on Wednesday than they did tonight so we’ll see how committed this Caps team is to playing playoff hockey on a consistent basis. Tonight was a good start with the season on the brink.