The Washington Capitals’ long homestand continued on Wednesday when the Pittsburgh Penguins came to town for the first time since last season’s legendary loffs. This game lacked the intensity of a Caps-Pens rivalry in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Other things it lacked included good passing and not-injuring-TJ-Oshie-multiple-times. This was a nasty game, but it had a happy ending.
Goal-scoring through the first two periods came from the usual suspects: Sidney Crosby scored for the Pens on a first-period power play, then Alex Ovechkin did the same on a second-period power play. As time ticked away in the third, who else would score the game-winner but the returned hero, TJ Oshie!
Caps win 2-1!
- TJ Oshie missed most of the first period after getting hit in the face (like, under his face shield) by a high stick (unpenalized) from Penguins defenseman Olli Maatta. Oshie squinted as he skated off the ice, but he returned for the second period, so I suppose he got lucky. Eye injuries suck. We’ll get back to Oshie later. Also, I did this:
peter did a art pic.twitter.com/JMOoZ81JV3
— RMNB (@rmnb) November 8, 2018
- Though this game was extra sloppy, it’s hard to deny that the Penguins ran the show – during 5-on-5 play at least. No Caps player had a positive shot-attempt differential, and a bunch of them were doubled up.
- Braden Holtby faced and denied 12 high-danger chances through two periods. He got beat on the power play once, but he was otherwise excellent – even with Penguins dudes crashing into him like a bunch of dorks. Holtby kept the Caps alive so that Oshie could slay the Pens.
- Crosby’s goal was assisted by Jack Johnson, who it turns out gets regular ice time on the Penguins power play. In 2018! What a country!
- In the second period, the Caps switched their defensive pairings to the following:
Orlov – Carlson
Djoos – Niskanen
Bowey – Kempny
- On the change, Reid Cashman told Ben Raby, “we just got to get going a little bit. We have to find a way to play better and execute at a higher level.”
- In the third period, Evgeni Malkin put a shoulder into the head of TJ Oshie. Malkin was ejected, and he’s gonna hear from player safety. Oshie, who has had a number of concussions, again left the game for a bit as the Caps earned a fruitless five-minute power play that was not very impressive at all.
- Some folks, after the Oshie hits, invoked the name of Tom Wilson. This is silly. Enforcers don’t prevent bad hits from occurring. Enforcers cannot get their teammates un-concussed. In their roles as enforcers, they can do only two things: 1) hit opponents after opponents hit their teammates badly, and 2) hit opponents badly to prompt other opponents to hit them.
This is a wonderful hockey game between Washington and Pittsburgh made that much better because the great Doc Emrick is calling it.
— Steve Simmons (@simmonssteve) November 8, 2018
- I would not like to discuss this tweet from Canada’s Greatest Hockey Writer and encased-meat fabulist, Steve Simmons. I’ve watched every Caps-Pens game in Crosby-Ovechkin era. This one was garbage. No one was passing well, there was no flow, and star moments were scant. Also, Doc Emrick is way too omnipresent in American hockey broadcasts for me to fake any appreciation for him anymore. I don’t even think he mentioned Hershey.
- Finally, the Caps’ 50/50 raffle raised almost 20 thousand dollars for the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh. I don’t know what to say, but I keep thinking of how, in the second book, everyone had to tell Katniss Everdeen to remember who the real enemy was, and she didn’t really understand what they all meant until suddenly she did.
@ovi8 welcoming Malkin to Capital One. #AllCaps 🤘 pic.twitter.com/a8qOUbpLV8
— Marcus Boutilier (@SportMajor) November 8, 2018
So, after suffering two injuries that would have shut me down for a month and in spite of all reason, TJ Oshie returned to the hockey game and won the dang thing, roofing the puck after a pass from John Carlson. What a pleasant ending to a nasty game. Hockey tells us some fun stories.
We’ll have to keep an eye (which may or may not have a lacerated cornea) on TJ Oshie’s health status. Same with any supplemental discipline for Evgeni Malkin. I’d rather not, however, look at the stats or highlights from this game ever again. By the numbers or the puck movement or the injuries, this was ugly.
Goodnight to everyone except everyone except Braden Holtby and TJ Oshie.
