Photo credit: Greg Fiume

Celebrating BL21's netter (Photo by Greg Fiume)

No jokes. Nothing cute. The Washington Capitals, deep into a slump, host the Anaheim adjective-less Ducks in a regular season game with a lot of additional gravity. Our hopes are high, our loins girded, our hearts full.

Here comes the arm.

Brooks Laich first marked up the board with a chip-in off of John Carlson during a first period powerplay. In the second, the oddly vowelled Joffrey Lupul put a bounce in the net– also while on powerplay. And it stayed that way until overtime, when Ryan Getzlaf escaped John Carlson’s coverage to wrist the game winner past Semyon Varlamov. Ducks beat Caps 2-1 (OT).

• Brooks Laich was the Caps best player by a mile. Scoring Washington’s only goal from within traffic, he led the offensive charge on every shift. He nearly scored the game-winner, a slow treacle from Hiller’s behind, but Ryan Getzlaf swatted it away. Laich’s 7 shots led the team, fitting for the player whose media quotes over the last few days were the hockey equivalent of FDR’s fireside chats.
• Alex Ovechkin‘s Russian Machine is not broken, but it may have been sabotaged. Ringing the post on a signature breakaway? That’s not bad luck; that’s cosmic malice.
• BBBB (Bench Boss Bruce Boudreau) did something odd tonight– matching the checking line of Laich-Steckel-Bradley up against Anaheim’s top line.
• Welcome back to the active duty, Mike Green. I see you’ve missed the game, as you were on ice for half of this one.
• The first period was a barnburner for the Caps, recording 17 shots on net. Those numbers are unsustainable perhaps, but it is certainly evidential of a focused team. The latter half probably suffered from lack of that effort.
• Who is at fault for the OTGWG: John Carlson; Scott Hannan; or Loki, the god of mischief? (Hint: we don’t care.)

Let’s not go crazy, everybody. We’re all bummed out, and Lord Voldemort is still up in the masthead creeping us out, but this will not last. This will not last. The Capitals were an offensive factory tonight, leading in shots 32 to 24 (We will update with scoring chances when Neil’s data are available), and soon you’ll see that effort manifest in a final score.

We’re gonna be alright, but we’ve got to power through the next few days of blowhard columnists and humorless humorists waxing assholic about our team. But Saturday will be on us before you know it. Up to Boston with us and onward to victory.

It’s a red letter day.

The three days since the Capitals 7-0 loss to the Rangers have been the most tumultuous the franchise has seen since the playoffs. In the interim we’ve talked about getting a new goalie, not getting a new goalie, dumping Bruce Boudreau, not dumping Bruce Boudreau, the curse of HBO, statistics so grim they seem actuarial, the colloquial and literal meanings of “going dark”, and the faintest glimmer of hope.

Tonight is the most important night of the Capitals’ season so far. Facing off against the Ducks at 7 PM, the Caps finally have a chance to end their six-game losing streak. At 10 PM, HBO will air the first episode of 24/7, reportedly including the team’s nadir in the form of Bruce Boudreau’s profanity-laden timeout speech at MSG. By this time tomorrow, we should have answers to all our questions:

1. Is the team healthy?
2. Have they recovered their offensive mojo?
3. Have they grouted the cracks in the defense?
4. Are they traumatized by their recent misfortune or resilient?
5. Have they gotten Joe Beninati to burn that cursed green suit?

And most important of all: will they play the sport like they love it?

* * *

Fans, I urge you: despair not. This really is the team you thought it was after all. Led by the most dynamic and exciting player in the sport, the Washington Capitals have within themselves an bottomless font of great hockey. To tap into it, they need only summon up what Brooks Laich called passion and hard work, but what you and I know is just loving and enjoying the game while you’re in it.

The Panic Protocol was a gag, but you already knew that. The world really is not doom and gloom, and these are not the end days of the Boudreau administration, merely its greatest challenge. For you and me, this is just the story we’ll retell in nostalgic tones between generous swigs from the Mug of Victory. Sometime in June.

That was when the team had its back against the wall, an army of cameras peering at it, and a raincloud constantly overhead. But they turned it around. By playing the kind of hockey we always knew they could.

You and me: we’re the stalwarts. We might waver and we might clap sarcastically from time to time, but we do not falter. Not ever.

Some define faith as an irrational belief, but there is nothing irrational about our belief in the team. They’re the best, and now they’re going to prove it.

Semyon “the Savior” Varlamov starts in net. Mike “Game Over” Green is back in action. The “heart and soul” of this team, Matt Bradley, will serve on the third line. Hershey hero Andrew Gordon is in town. And Captain Alex Ovechkin leads them into battle.

Clear eyes. Full hearts. Can’t lose.

Warmups:

Money Seats!

More of Warmups

Green welcomes Holtby to the NHL

Someone make the guy in the hat sit down.  I’ll update this thread during the game.  Engage CAPS LOCK.

UPDATE: ….And two periods later that’s still all we have received. Stevie K must have dropped his new Droid phone in those disgusting toilets or in the garlic sauce that came with his 12-dollar Papa Johns pizza. Or maybe Slapshot beaned him with a burrito and now he’s dead. It better be that last one, cause I’ll never forgive him otherwise.

ANOTHER UPDATE: K’s camera working again!! We have two new batches!

PERIOD: UNKNOWN

???????????

Laich sitting on the goal?

Another Picture of the guy in a Getzlaf jersey. K aim higher!

No idea.

Did someone score or is this the start of the third period?

UHHH ???

PHOTO NOT BY STEVIE K. CAN YOU TELL??

Well this ultimately ended in terrible failure. We apologize to the 3 of you who clicked every 5 minutes eagerly awaiting good photos. Until next time!