Capital Punishment

[CamKneely]

The President's Trophy winning Washington Capitals beat the Edmonton Oilers in their first round series, 4 games to 1. After years of playoff failures, Vocally Caged the Caps took one small step towards not crying myself to sleep this time the Stanley Cup Finals in a close, hard-won battle.

Game One, however, belonged to Edmonton. Ales Hemsky scored the first goal of the series, and the Caps failed to recover despite a dazzling performance from Michael Neuvirth, who made several key saves to keep the Caps from getting completely embarrassed. Taylor Hall was the star of this one, scoring twice. Alex Ovechkin scored a goal late for the Caps but was stymied virtually every time he tried to get a shot off by the tough Edmonton defenders.

Edmonton would score the first two goals of game 2 as well, drawing gasps and boos from the Capitals stunned fans, who thought maybe this was finally the year I'd the Caps would stop choking like dogs in the clutch. Eberle and Brule would strike 12 seconds apart in the first, and things looked bleak for Washington, until a charging call to Brooks Laich would change the series. Marco Sturm scored shorthanded, and if that wasn't bad enough, after Jeff Schultz took a penalty for charging as well right after the goal, John Erskine scored to tie the game at 2. Playoff veteran Jason Arnott would score 55 seconds into the third, giving the undisciplined Caps a narrow win.

Game three was a wild affair, as the Caps finally settled down, getting penalized only once compared to game 2 when they were sent to the box 7 times, but their one penalty came at the worst time and nearly cost them the win. Semin, Knuble, and Laich all scored 46 seconds apart less than 2 minutes in, putting the Caps up big. This time a pair of shorthanded goals came in Edmonton's favor though, as Cogliano and Horcoff would both score on the same penalty kill, and Horcoff would then tie the game after the penalty ended. Backstrom scored to give the Caps the lead again, but a late slashing call to Mike Green with less than 2 minutes left opened the door for Cogliano to strike again and tie the game with 35 seconds left after being sprung by spunky rookie Linus Omark. The game ended on a really weird play. Washington was offside after a rush into the Oilers zone, then somehow Mike Knuble managed to swipe at the puck as it squirted out from against the boards...and beat Khabibulin! The Oilers fans screamed bloody murder and threw an assortment of beverages and food at the officials, as it seemed they had blown an offside call, but the goal stood as Washington escaped again.

Ovechkin scored to open game four on a brilliant individual effort, bouncing off of four Oilers en route to the net, and it seemed the Oilers' spirits were broken. Knuble followed with a goal, drawing massive boos and hisses from the stands. Edmonton would battle back and tie the game at 3 after a Backstrom goal put the Caps up 3-1, but a devastating play happened with 4:55 left in the third. Parjavi was called for slashing right after Eberle ran Neuvirth, getting an interference call. The devastating 2 minute 5-on-3 for Washington finally paid off when Ovechkin scored with 16 seconds left on the penalty.

Game 5 was total domination by the Caps, perhaps motivated by the whining of the Oilers fans that their series lead was undeserved. Knuble, Arnott, and Backstrom would score less than 2 minutes in. The tide seemed to be stemmed when Eberle scored, to make it 3-1, a shaky lead for the Caps all series, but another devastating shorthanded goal by Marco Sturm sent the Oilers down for the count for good. Sturm also scored the 9th goal, putting an explanation point on his strong series, as he helped lead the Caps penalty killers, who seemed to be on the ice for entire periods of every game except game 2.

[kingraph]

Great write up!

[PRoBob38]

Nice, hadn't had a write-up in this league yet.