Game 4 Caps @ Canadiens 4-21-2010 Preview

Series A: Washington Capitals (56-29; 121 points; 1st Southeast Division, 1st Eastern Conference, 1st Overall) vs. Montreal Canadiens (40-45; 88 points; 4th Northeast Division, 8th Eastern Conference, 19th Overall):
Caps Playoff Game #4, Road Playoff Game #2, NHL Playoff Game #114

Bell Centre, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, 7:07 pm. Washington TV: Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic. Radio: WJFK 106.7-FM. Montreal TV: None. Radio: CJAD 880-AM.  Canadian National TV: TSN, RDS (French).  NHL Center Ice: Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic feed.

Tonight, the Caps, with a 2-1 lead, look to take total control of their first round series with the Montreal Canadiens in Game 4.  The Caps are 14-15 All-Time in Game 4 with a 7-8 record on the road and an 8-6 record with a 2-1 lead in the series.

What The Natives Are Saying:

(Com)Post: powering up, American Idol, best in the business.  Examiner: simple strategy, keeping up abroad.  Caps.com.

Neutral Views:

NHL.com: Preview, stealing the show, power outage.  AP Wire.  Canadian Press.  ESPN.com.

Open Source Intelligence:

Montreal Gazette:  red meat, really bad idea, digging up old news, more changes in goal.  Canadiens.com: going hard, 5 New Keys.

What Do We Expect Tonight?:

Well folks, we don't want to go too far in this but it is time for the Caps to get serious and go about putting away the Canadiens tonight.  Yeah, yeah we know that they need two more wins, not one, to close out this series but we're not buying this "calm, cool, and collected" act from Montreal.  They clearly blew a gasket on Monday night after the Caps got out to a 4-0 lead in the second period and they'll do it again if the Caps get out to any lead tonight.  There's no reason why Semyon "The Saviour" Varlamov shouldn't get the start tonight and instead of absorbing the Montreal pressure for the first period, the Caps should look to grab an early lead tonight.  Carey Price is likely to be in net and he has shown that he can't handle the pressure of a playoff game in Montreal.  If the Caps can get out to an early lead tonight, the crowd will do a 180 turn on really come down hard on the home team making their meltdown all the more complete.

Caps Nut Official Prediction:

Caps 6
Canadiens 2
Winner by Backstrom
(2-1 in the playoffs, 49-38 for the year with two perfect games)