Caps at Blue Jackets: Please No More Cannons

January 27, 2015 3:58 pm

mup mup mup

Welcome back, fans of actual hockey games. The grotesque obscenity of All-Star weekend is now behind us, so we can focus on — well, I sorta forget.

Jog my memory. The team we follow is the Capitals, yeah?. The other guys are the Blue Jackets, and I can’t remember if they’re good or not. Let’s say yes since the Oilers were awful and somehow won anyway.

Tonight the Capitals (or ‘Tals as they’re called among youths) will perform a hockey match at the Blue Jackets’ home base field. The puck will be tipped at 7 PM on the CSN channel with Joe Bonaducci and his collection of interesting hats.

Team	Record	Possession	PDO	Power Play	Penalty Kill
Washington Capitals	24-13-9	52.5%	100.2	24.4%	79.5%
Columbus Blue Jackets	20-22-3	46.1%	98.3	24.3%	79.5%

Projected Lineup

Let us not waste our time in idle discourse! Let us do something, while we have the chance! It is not every day that we are needed. Not indeed that we personally are needed. Others would meet the case equally well, if not better. To all mankind they were addressed, those cries for help still ringing in our ears! But at this place, at this moment of time, all mankind is us, whether we like it or not. Let us make the most of it, before it is too late! Let us represent worthily for once the foul brood to which a cruel fate consigned us! What do you say? It is true that when with folded arms we weigh the pros and cons we are no less a credit to our species. The tiger bounds to the help of his congeners without the least reflection, or else he slinks away into the depths of the thickets. But that is not the question. What are we doing here, that is the question. And we are blessed in this, that we happen to know the answer. Yes, in this immense confusion one thing alone is clear. We are waiting for Godot to come—

That means no changes to the lines. Holtby in net. According to Prewitt:

Ovechkin – Backstrom – Burakovsky
Johansson – Kuznetsov – Brouwer
Laich– Fehr– Ward
Chimera – Beagle – Wilson

Orpik – Carlson
Alzner – Niskanen
Hillen – Green

Holtby

Best Thing on the Internet Today

I found John Hodgman’s spiel on political correctness today enlightening. It begins with this:

No one asked (being the definition of Twitter) but here are my thoughts about the @jonathanchait piece in @NYMag. About to @HeerJeet it so..

— John Hodgman (@hodgman) January 27, 2015

Storylines

Check out how similar these teams’ special teams numbers are at top.
Ovi, good-deed-doer. Monster writing by Ian here.
What Barry Trotz does not want when his team has the lead.
Japers Rink basically published a book about the Caps today, so just read it all.
Brooks Orpik is having a rough season, if you go by the ol’ PIM counter.
Read Lambert’s second-half preview. He doesn’t trash the Caps and gets two good digs in on the other A.O.
Marty Brodeur‘s done. The only way his all-time win record will ever get broken is if there’s a slightly above-average goalie somewhere who stays in the league for way too long, costing his decent team a playoff run before spoiling his legacy with another club that typically has way better goaltending than he could offer.