Caps vs. Canadiens 11-28-2008 Post-Mortem

Not bad considering the Caps were facing a team with 5 NHL All-Stars on it... Onto the Battle Damage Assessment...

THE GOOD:

• Jose "Alvin, Simon," Theodore with a much better performance tonight than Wednesday and got a well-deserved shutout of his former team.
• Not only did the Penalty Killers kill off all three penalties tonight, they did it without allowing a single shot on goal. It doesn't get much better than that kids.
• It's a shame that the members of the fourth line, Boyd Gordon, Mr. Donald Brashear, and Chris Bourque Bourque Bourque couldn't produce a goal tonight with the consistent forechecking pressure they applied. Though we did find it weird that Montreal decided to crash the net when this line was on the ice.

THE BAD:

• If Sami "Sosa" Lepisto is in a death struggle with Karl "Malden" Alzner to stay with the big club, he's not only losing it, he's losing it badly as he was once again beaten all over the ice like a scrambled egg at breakfast.
• You could see that the blueline was very inexperienced as the Caps had trouble getting the puck cleared for most of the night. Which only makes Theodore's shutout more impressive.
• A night after shepherding a player making his NHL debut, Milan Jurcina was doing some inexplicable rain dancing on the ice time at times tonight.

THE UGLY:

• It turned into the game winning goal the Caps but that doesn't stop Francis Bouillon's giveaway to Tomas Fleischmann in front of his own net getting tonight's John "Coach's Pet" Erskine Bowles Bonehead Play of the Game Award.
• You mean to tell us that the Caps got a 1:42 5-on-3, put five forwards, four of them centers, on the ice for the during of the advantage, and could only muster one shot? We're used to see the Power Play blow 5-on-3's but this was a special kind of ugly tonight.
• Wes Johnson announcing that $1 Hot Dog Night on December 4th will feature the Islanders versus the Islanders. Huh?

Brent Johnson may get the start in Columbus tomorrow night simply because it will be the third game in four days on a back-to-back night but make no mistake, Jose "Alvin, Simon" Theodore showed why he is the number one goaltender in Washington, D.C. The only goalie controversy is reserved for those who still haven't gotten over Christobal Huet bailing out on the Caps over the summer. The Caps, with seven regulars out and four minor league defensemen skating tonight, needed above average goaltending to win tonight and got more than that. While you cannot argue with the results of the past two games, one has to wonder just how much longer can the Hershey crew continue to provide the steady production of the players they've replaced for the time being. But the fact that the Caps can win when this shorthanded shows that maybe this team has more depth than originally thought. Time will tell.

It has been... A TWO POINT NIGHT!!!