Caps vs. Canes 10-7-2006 Post-Mortem

Well, two winless teams met and the Caps came out the winner tonight. A better overall effort from the Caps tonight as the Cap won 5-2. Before the game, Tomas Fleischmann was called up to replace Boyd Gordon.

THE GOOD:

• Alexander Semin his hat trick tonight gives him 5 4 goals in 2 games so far. He's proving to be the player that the Caps expected. Teams are going to have to pay more attention to him.
• And the more teams pay attention to Semin, the more room A.O. will have. A.O had two goals tonight and it is simply amazing how much energy not he but the team also gets when he scores.
• A better overall effort tonight from the entire team. They took advantage of a tired Carolina squad and a pumped crowd for the home opener.

THE BAD:

• Mike Green played like the rookie that he is tonight. He can only get better but Jamie "Home Run" Heward might want to look into switching back to baseball.
• The Power Play went a combined 0-12 before finally scoring tonight. They then needed an extended 5-on-3 to score again. Let's hope that these two goals can get this unit rolling.
• Does anybody know where John Erskine is? The Caps tried to introduce him tonight (even though he was a healthy scratch) and he wasn't there during introductions. The Caps didn't have a picture of him for the videoboard and they still haven't created a profile for him on Caps.com.

THE UGLY:

• For the first 6 minutes of the second period, the Caps played like they did on Thursday night and surrendered the lead. Luckily Donald Brashear came out and threw a few hits and got the team's legs moving again.
• Tim Gleason's kneeing of A.O. and the 44 seconds that came after he was sent to the penalty box. During that stretch the Canes were not interested in playing hockey and were only interested in hurting people. When the whistle blew, two Canes were sent to the box which created the extended 5-on-3 that the Caps used to put the game away. Quite frankly all 4 Canes on the ice deserved to go to the box and how Mike Commodore avoided taking a penalty is beyond me. As I said yesterday, the NHL must stop this stuff if they ever want to grow the game.
• Rod Brind'Amour:

The Alex and Alex show took over tonight. With 5 4 goals now in 2 games, Semin is on pace for a mere 205 164 goals this season. (I believe that would be a record.) The Caps plan of giving opposing teams somebody else to worry about was in full force tonight and I am not talking about Donald Brashear. Though Richard Zednik is still MIA, A.O. was able to get two goals himself tonight facing the top Carolina defenders. It is only two games into the season, but the "experts" who whined about the Caps not getting A.O. any help are looking rather foolish. When Semin was here three years ago it was clear that if the kid could ever learn how to finish, he would be a fun player to watch. Well, so far it looks like he's learned how to finish off his chances.

It has been ... A TWO POINT NIGHT!