January 07, 2009
Capitals Edge Flyers in Shootout
There was a lot of talk by the Caps coming into last night's game against the Flyers as they looked to change their luck against Philly. While most Caps fans wanted to see a rout after being whipped 7-1 in their last meeting, it took a shootout, and maybe a little divine intervention, for the Caps to gain the two points. Says J.P. at Japers' Rink;
In the good ol' days, this game would have been a hard fought tie. Nowadays, we get to watch the ice resurfacing machines do their laps (twice, in fact) followed by a mini-skills competition. The result last night was a Caps win and two fantastic points (especially given Boston's regulation loss in Minny), but it wasn't, as HeartbreakRidge put it in the Open Thread, "the cathartic ass kicking" we were all hoping for - I guess we'll circle February 24 on our calendars for the next opportunity.
Ed Moran of the Philadelphia Daily News made a note of pointing out how tough it was for the Caps to beat an injury-depleted Flyers team.
A healthy Washington team that started the game with a 17-1-1 record at home couldn't put away a depleted Flyers group, despite an early power-play goal, and the Capitals needed the shootout to grab the extra point, defeating the Flyers, 2-1, in the Verizon Center last night...Given all that background noise, the Caps should have come out and run the dinged-up Flyers out of the rink.
The Peerless points out that while the Flyers played a strong defensive game, the Caps didn't help themselves by pushing for the extra pass or pretty shot, and not giving themselves enough quality scoring chances, despite 77 shot attempts. As always, The Peerless leaves us with some words of wisdom.
In the end, Flyers fans might say, “we earned a point,” and Caps fans might say, “we escaped with a win.” Certainly in the post-game radio call-in show, you’d have thought the Caps lost this game. To their credit, the Flyers did play a whale of a defensive game under their circumstances. But remember, two is always greater than one, even for very large values of “1.”
The Caps are off until Friday, and Tomas Fleischmann and Sergei Fedorov could return to the lineup then. Tom Poti did not practice today. Chris Clark missed the last several minutes of last night's game after being accidentally hit by Ovechkin, but it is only a precaution. Corey Masisak says that Clark "is ok and doesn't expect to miss any time."
When Fedorov returns from LTIR, the Caps will be over the salary cap, meaning Karl Alzner would have to be sent back down. Tarik thinks that putting Poti on LTIR would be a good short-term solution that can buy the Caps some more time to decide what they want to do. But for right now a decision has yet to be made.
"I don't want him, or anyone else, hanging on every word I say about what could happen," McPhee said when asked if he would consider sending Alzner back to Hershey. "We'll just see how things go, and we'll make decisions as we move along."
I, like many others, have been pleased by the play of Alzer this season. He has frequently logged over 20 minutes of ice time a game, is a +6, and has worked well with his frequent partner, Milan Jurcina. Moving him down would hurt the Caps, but in terms of the salary cap it seems an inevitable move when the whole roster is healthy.
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06:40 PM