Detroit Red Wings @ Washington Capitals 1/31/09

2:07 P.M. At the end of the second it's a close game which is great as the Red Wings are one of the two powerhouses of the West (San Jose being the other). Unfourtunately due to bad penalties and some sloppy turnovers this game is a lot more tense than it could be. When the Red Wings drew first blood with Leno's between the legs backhand goal we quickly returned it with a deflection goal off of Milan Jurcina's slapshot from the blueline. Late in the second the Caps took the lead as Nicklas Backstrom was able to flip the puck back to Mike Green while entangled with a Red Wing player on the ground and Green wristed one past Red Wing's goalie Ty Conklin. But less than a minute later Semin commited yet another of his bad penalties as he tripped/hooked Marian Hossa of the Wings. Franzen wasted no time in deflecting a shot past Theodore. The good news is that we are very much in this game and are showing that we can play against the other superpower's of the league.

Again gotta say I'm getting fed up with Semin's bad penalties, it's time to have someone sit down and talk with him before this bad habit hurts his great play.

Recap: WHAT A GAME!!! Glad Ovechkin got those 2 goals to take the NHL Goal Scoring lead away from Jeff Carter and it's gonna be a game that the critics are going to talk about for a long time. We're really starting to prove ourselves against the best in the league.

Good News for Caps As Boston Loses in OT to Devils

Great news for the Washington Capitals as the Boston Bruins lose 4-3 in OT when Jamie Langerbrunner got a goal past Bruins goalie Tim Thomas. Unfourtunately Boston escaped the match with a point because of their three 3rd period goals to even the game. Nonetheless because of this a win against the Detroit Redwings will not only prove our mettle against the NHL's best but also bring the Caps a point close to closing the gap on the Eastern Confrence Leading Bruins.

And The Game to Watch Tonight Is...

It’s definitely gotta be the Rangers @ Pittsburgh at 7:30 PM Eastern Time. It’s gonna be a good one and it’s got two of our rivals playing. The only tough part about this game is who I want to lose. The Rangers are breathing down our neck in the standings but we always seem to do well against them but we haven’t had too much trouble with Pittsburgh either and I’d like to see Ovechkin and the Caps thrash em’ some more in the playoffs. I’m gonna have to go with Pittsburgh losing because it would be nice to shut up all the Crosby and Malkin fans.

Caps @ Bruins 3-2 in OT

A disappointing loss for the Caps on Tuesday but we had a solid offense the entire game and the defense was decent except for some extremely costly turnovers. Jose Theodore is finally earning his paycheck, at least a good portion of it. At the end of the second period Ovechkin got hit hard and was down on the ice for about 15 seconds before he started moving. A real scare for Caps fans everywhere but he came back in the third and he appeared to be fine. I’m glad to see we competed with Boston for the entire game, especially since we’re probably going face them come playoffs. Also our power play unit was awesome which is a great sign. Still a lot work to be done on the penalty kill though, until we shore that up we can’t be taking any penalties especially bad ones like Semin’s tripping penalty in the Ottawa game. We’re going to have to fix that if we have any chance of going deep in the playoffs.