Photo: Islesblogger
Barring a postseason meeting, tonight will be the last time the Washington Capitals will ever play at Nassau Coliseum.
Nassau is a weird beast, smallish by NHL standards, hard to reach using mass transit, but beloved for its legacy and dumpy-ness nonetheless.
It was here that Bossy scored at will. It was here that Potvin won three Norrises. It was here that Dale Hunter made the cheapest of cheap shots (and earned what was at the time the longest suspension in league history).
The Isles brought the Cup home to Nassau four times– in a freaking row– in the early eighties. Now, at the edge of 2015, I wouldn’t be too surprised if they do it again. The Isles are a good team, and they’d certainly like to make Nassau proud before they move to Brooklyn, the edge of the island, at the start of next season.
7 on PM on CSN. Let’s say goodbye to the old dump together. Go Caps.
| Team | Record | Possession | PDO | Power Play | Penalty Kill |
| Washington Capitals | 18-11-6 | 51.3% | 100.1 | 23.8% | 78.2% |
| New York Islanders | 23-11-1 | 53.0% | 99.5 | 17.9% | 74.0% |
Projected Lineup
Bizarro top line! Will they do this tonight? Probably not! Is Trotz messing with us? Almost certainly yes! From Prewitt:
Chimera – Backstrom – Ovechkin
Johansson – Kuznetsov – Brouwer
Laich– Fehr – Ward
Beagle – Latta – Wilson
Orpik – Carlson
Alzner – Niskanen
Hillen – Green
Holtby
Best Thing on the Internet Today
News bloopers! NSFW unless you’ve got headphones or a really cool office.
Storylines
- Barry Trotz on the secret to winning in December: “We’re hopefully becoming a little hardened, more consistent team.” That ain’t it. That played well, but they won because they shot 10% and saved 94%. It cannot last. Sorry, consistency.
- Did you read yesterday’s Snapshot? I wrote it, and I’ll be sad if you don’t read it.
- The Isles are dominant during 5v5, but they kind of stink at special teams. Their S.T. index is 91.9 versus the Capitals’ 102. So… get scrappy?
- No alumni game, but a bunch of Caps alums will be kicking it at the Hilton on the 31st.
- Nats Park gettin’ pretty.
- Slava Voynov‘s suspension will become the longest in NHL history tonight. (Good.)
- I’m just gonna embed this tweet with Trotz’s take on lines, since I don’t know how to talk about this.
https://twitter.com/alex_prewitt/status/549617042920591360
- Jaroslav Halak in net for the Isles. He’s 100% comfortable with it.
- Canadian intelligence spends its time on hockeytalk.com.
- After a bad game on Saturday, Sidney Crosby is slumping. Puck Daddy says the slump is just noise. Pensblog disagrees.
- Two historical things that didn’t take place at Nassau, just because I looked it up: 1) obviously, the Easter Epic was at the Caps Centre; 2) Billy Smith scored the NHL’s first goal by a goalie on the road in Colorado.
What You’re Missing on TV Tonight
Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows: Part 2 is on ABC Family again. It’s always on. Here’s what I said about it last time, and I freaking stand by it:
Join in the adventure as Harry and his pals wrap up a story about equality, corruption, and rebellion with a finale that has nothing to do with any of that. Nineteen years after the Battle of Hogwarts, the miserable, horribly broken wizarding system in the UK is alive and well, but at least we got to learn all the exhilarating details of who owned which wand and when.
