3

1

They looked a little rusty. The (recently) typical slow start seemed inevitable after the first five minutes, but the Caps bounced back and closed out their season series with the Sabres on the road with a win. Considering all the trade deadline hoopla, I'm going to keep this one short and sweet. I'll post some analysis of each pickup later on this afternoon, but let's hit some points from last night's win:

• I think Locker hit the nail on the head when he pointed out an early Sabres advantage because they had skated the night before. The Caps had to skate some rust out, and committed two early penalties. It didn't take them long to adjust though, as they drew two of their own from a relatively disciplined opponent.
• Jason Chimera seemed to be skating with a lot of purpose, and he was certainly rewarded during the first goal. He kept his line buzzing early and injected his team with a big dose of energy.
• Boyd Gordon seemed to be skating as well. Think he's a little concerned about ice time come April?
• Ryan Miller is not going to be a fun playoff goalie to face this year. The saves on Ovechkin's curl-and-drag as well as Chimera's cross-ice pass to Fehr really kept his team in the game.
• BMo and Fleischmann were both below 30% in the dot on the night. Hello Eric Bellanger.
• Speaking of faceoffs, is Nick Backstrom slowly turning into a reliable draw man? It seems like he's gotten stronger of late.
• I think the communication problems that come from a long layoff were never more present then on Buffalo's first goal. Mike Green and Jeff Schultz cannot have gaffes like that one in the playoffs.

Hero of the Night:

Jose Theodore. Of all the Capitals tonight that took the ice, Theo looked the hungriest. That's a VERY good thing.

Comments (0)

Name

Email

Website

Title

Comment

smaller | bigger

Subscribe via email (registered users only)

Add Comment