Struggling to Find Time ... to Blog and Other Things Too

Well it's now been a little over 6 weeks since I last did a blog post where in I declared my intent to revive my blogging waves and my life is conspiring to make that hard by keeping me too busy now that I am out of the habit of blogging my ideas and thought, especially my Washington Capital elated thoughts every other day or so.  Alas I will still try ... dagnabbit, I WILL.

Well since my last blog post on October 7th, "OUR" Washington Capitals have played 21 additional games, been up and down, and now seem to be settling in for the remaining ~ 3/4 of the NHL season with the type of game and effort we grew accustomed to last season.  The Capitals are now 13-7-3 sitting just barely atop the Metropolitan Division and facing the NY Islanders coached by Barry Trotz , himself.  The Islanders are surprising everyone being a well coached team playing with great structure and showing the league there is "life after JT (John Tavares.)

The last two weeks the Caps played eight games and have compiled a 6-2-0 record.  The Caps now have First Line Tom Wilson back on the ice, are playing with both Evgeny Kuznetsov and TJ Oshie out of the lineup; and with Brooks Orpik also out of the line-up.  Lots of guys are stepping up and making a difference but there is no doubt the Tom Wilson's return is helping to motivate the team, as is his play.  Alex Ovechkin is also playing awesomely, the 33 year old, generational talent LW has 5 G and 2 A in his last five games and now is on pace for a 6oG season,  Another guy stepping up to make sure Kuznetsov being out of the lineup doesn't hurt the Caps too badly is 31 year old Nicklas Backstroke.  Back is also playing pretty awesomely - he has 2G and 3A in the Caps Last five games and a 51.27% FO win rate and a total of 25 points (6G & 19A) in the 23GP for the season thus far.  If your counting that's on pace for 89 points this season.

Both John Carlson and Dmitry Orlov have stepped it u and Madison Bowey and Christian Djoos have elevated their games too to fill the gaps left by steady Eddie stay at home D-Man Brooks Orpik's absence.  Frankly  Matt Niskenan and Michael Kempny have also elevated their games so that's really good news.  Finally when Braden Holtby was out of the lineup for a couple of three games, Phoenix Copely showed me that all least for this season, he's the Caps solid answer for a backup goaltender.

In just an hour or so the Caps face off against Trotz and the Islanders - if when they win they will have a six game win streak going and will have clearly shaken the "Cup Hangover."

I'm predicting the Caps will maintain their structure and discipline as did the NY Rangers last week when they beat the Islanders 5-0. Since that game against the Rangers, the Isles have beaten the Devils and the Hurricanes in relatively low scoring affairs but they (the Islanders) scored 4 against the Devils and $ against the Hurricanes.  I'm predicting this game will be even lower scoring and the Caps will win 3-2 in Regulation.

Islander Players to Watch: Mathew Barzel & Leo Karmorov
Capitals Players to Watch:  Alex Ovechkin & Dmitry Orlov

LETS GO CAPS!!!!!

Should I or Shouldn't I ? ... Blog That Is

Last March I threatened to return to blogging but now I really do think it's time.  After watching the first two Capitals games of the 2018-19 season and a couple of other games I think I'm ready to actually do it.  I hope I can again become disciplined and rigorous enough to muse and blog about hockey at least after every Caps game this season and maybe even about a couple other things in my middle age pretty boring life.  To catch up, we no longer live in Bucolic Bristow, or Charleston.  We're back in Northern VA and now living in Friendly Fairfax.  Fairfax is nice! It's closer - no more daily 30+ mile commute to Arlington/Crystal City via and with the traffic on the Sunset Strip.  Why it took me 22 years to realize, that for us, a place like this, and a smaller house (in square footage) was right for us, I have no idea, That said both my wife and I and our furry family members are very happy here - side bonus is it's A LOT easier to get to and from Capital One Center, and a lot other places in the DCMVA area we typically go.  Enough about me, what about hockey?  Well, I still split the tickets with two former colleagues I used to work with - it's a great arrangement.  I never gave up the tickets or on the Capitals so they are still awesome seats with and around awesome fellow hockey fans in Section 103.  So here we go, I'm gonna blog again.

As I mentioned earlier, I did not have the tickets for opening night so I watched that game on NBCsN.  I also watched the Pittsburgh game at home. Both were great games to watch IMO, even though the Bruins really were not ready to play on opening night.  The Caps retained their structure and the result showed what they could do - which is basically play the same way that propelled them through the playoffs to the Cup.  The first line 8, 92, and 10 in for 43 looked very good the entire game.  13-19-77 looked very good and very fast when they need/wanted to.  63-20-18 was very solid and fast, in fact 18 (Stephenson) was wicked fast a couple of times in GM 1 vs Boston, but flashed his speed even more-so the following evening in Pittsburgh.  The fourth line looked very good as well during game 1, I think we're all going to decide Nic Dowd was another great pickup by GMBM The fact that during the 7-0 trouncing of the Bruins the scoring came from six different players across all four lines last seasons leading scoring defenseman - John Carlson, and the Matt Niskanen, and even Braden Holtby had assists was #awesome.  Simply put, Game 1 could not have gone better for the Caps all around.  The team played fast, structured hockey and there were no passengers.

Game 2 in Pittsburgh was a different story.  We can all whine about starting the season with a back to back against two good opponents, but why should we - what would be the point? I submit there is none.  Look the Caps-Pens rivalry is fun hockey to watch anytime.  Game 2 for the Capitals was Game 1 and the Home Opener for the Penguins.  It needed up being fire wagon hockey, a least on the score sheet.  The Caps had their chances to win it for sure.  Their legs as a group didn't look like they held up as well as we Caps fans would have liked to have seen, especially in the this period when they took three penalties because, IMO, of the Pens moving their feet better and faster.  That said, the Caps did have their chances to put the game away, they led 3-2 after the first period, trailed 5-4 after the second, and forced overtime at 6-6 thanks to two goals from TJ Oshie in the third.  They lost in OT 7-6 with Evgeni Kuznetsov in the penalty box and the Pens on the PP.  Given as Sidney Crosby said in post game comments "It's not often you win a game giving up 6 goals in this league" -it's even less often you win one if you give up 7 goals.  As pretty and well executed as Game 1 was for the Caps, Game 2 was that chaotic, crazy and unstructured by both teams, I'm sure neither coaching staff was all that happy with what they saw from their teams in the Caps Game 2.

For the Caps the consolation is they finished the first two games of the season and their first set of back to backs against two good teams earning 3 out of 4 possible points.  They then have a rest until this coming Wednesday when they take on VGK, here at home.  I can't wait that's the first "real" game of this season that I will be at.

LETS GO CAPS!!!!!!

I'm Back ....

    Well after a two year hiatus from blogging I've decided to give it a try again.  I'm going to go back to my beginnings though and blog about all my musings, not just the Washington Capitals.  Though, how about those Capitals?  Tonight they beat the Islanders for the second time in two nights and are now in first place in the Metropolitan division as the regular season has only 11 games remaining for most teams.  Even more importantly the Caps have now rebounded, IMO, from playing very lackluster hockey to playing 7-3-0 in their last 10 games.  That's looking pretty good, IMO.  Next up on Sunday is an important game against the Flyers in Philadelphia.

   How about the NCAA Tournament? aka March Madness?  Can you believe UMBC? I know I was shocked - pleasantly.

    Also in other news, we've moved back to the DC Metro area - last October and just today closed on the purchase of a "new to us" house in Fairfax City.  I've changed jobs and am now working for a small local software company and there we're moving offices too.  So lots of change going on for me.

Basically, life is good.  Well more thoughts and musings later...

2015-16 Washington Caps: Just How Good Is 98 Points in 63 Games, and What Do The Caps Need to Do Now To Reach Their Goal?

Wow, ... just wow.  That's how good 98 points in 63 games is - the Capitals have played 0.7778 hockey over the course of the season thus far; in the 77% of the season completed to date, the Capitals have basically amassed enough points so that they would have qualified for the playoffs in either conference last season.  That's pretty good in itself.  Then consider these items, the Caps:

• Current Goal Differential (+63) is already better than last season's awesome +60 goal differential by the 2015 President's Trophy winning NY Rangers.
• The Caps current GF/Game and GA/Game numbers are right up there with last season's league leaders numbers as well.
• The Caps current record over the last 10 games 7-3-0 is the third best in the league behind only Anaheim's perfect 10-0-0 and Tampa Bay's 8-2-0 numbers despite the fact the league leading Capitals are 7 1/2 games ahead of the second place (for the league) Black Hawks and 9 1/2 games ahead of the New York Rangers in the Eastern Conference.  Both the Ducks and the Lightning on the other hand are now in dogfights to win their division after relatively slow starts to their seasons.  To be clear the Caps have shown basically slow starts to their games over the last 10 plus games but have responded over the course of those games and shown their talent and compete levels are there and able to find ways to take control of most games and win against anyone and play in "heavy style and games."

Basically from a general perspective, the challenges now for the Caps between no and April 15th is integrating their trade deadline pickups to the lineup, which shouldn't be overly difficult since GMBM's pickups were for depth vice addressing any key position needs.  The other thing they need to do is to stay interested and get or stay healthy. That means continuing to play the right way and make sure they don't develop any bad habits over the last 19 games of the season.

What do the Caps need to do to reach their goal - which is to still be playing and winning in June? That's a harder question, if the season ended today I think their road to that goal would be through: Pittsburgh; Madison Square Garden (NYR); Tampa Bay; and either Chicago, LA, or Anaheim.  Think about that and you can clearly see why the Stanley Cup really is the most difficult Professional Sports Championship to win.  Despite likely winning the league regular season by 5 or more games, to win the Championship the Caps will have to win 16 of what will likely be 22+ games against other teams who now have average records of 0.620 and are all very solid, accomplished teams of prideful, professionals.  That's a long row to hoe for anyone who wants to win "The Cup."  To do so will, as with prior years, take complete teams playing complete 200' hockey for sixty or sixty plus minutes per game.  Thankfully the Capitals are a deeper and stronger on the puck hockey team then they've been, possibly ever, but certainly for any time over the past decade.  They now have eight (8) NHL quality defensemen capable of playing in basically any situation - yes I'm assuming that John Carlson will end the regular season back in the lineup and in awesome playing shape for the start of the playoffs.  They have two (2) NHL quality goalies, on having a season clearly worthy of Vezina Trophy consideration, and I predict assuming they have a deep playoff run the way he's been playing Holtby is likely to be in consideration for the Conn Smythe as well.  Then there's the Caps depth on the forward lines, the Caps are clearly a four line team with threats on all four lines from Rocket Richard leading Alex Ovechkin to late season pickup fourth line Center Mike Richards.  As long as they continue to play the right way and play a 200' game generating their scoring chances from sound defense and solid breakouts from their own zone, the Caps at times appear unstoppable.  That said the road to Lord Stanley's Cup will be through four other teams whose fans and Bloggers will likely be justifiably writing similar comments and accolades.  One things for sure, the next two months we Capital's fans will be again treated to some excellent hockey contests and I am as optimistic as I've ever been that will continue into June.

LETS GO CAPS

- starting with tonight's game against the Rangers at Verizon Center.