Last night was another hockey travel night. We headed up to Hershey to watch John Carlson's triumphant homecoming...

...
...
... Except he's up with the Caps right now.

C'est la vie; we still saw a fantastic game!

The Bears kept their foot on the Penguins' throat until the last minute. There were several fights, including one involving Jay Beagle as the final buzzer sounded. He left the ice with arms raised triumphantly, and who could blame him? He won!

In their last two games, the Bears have scored 17 goals.

Seventeen.

One-Seven.

Yeah. Thassalotta goals!

Pictures are here!

I was late to the game tonight, so I missed Alex Ovechkin's 48-seconds-in goal. I arrived just about the time the team was finishing killing off the boarding call on Nicklas Backstrom.

What is up with that, anyway? Did he *do it?* Or are the referees being idiots again?

Anyway, I was there for the rest of the game.

Slaughter.

Whatever you want to call it, the Maple Leafs were outplayed. Towards the end of the game, things got a little chippy (to say the least), and fighting majors were handed out liberally. Shaone Morrisonn took on Colton Orr, and Jason Chimera took on Jay Rosehill; both ShaMo and Chimmer were kicked from the game, and took instigator penalties, but they stuck up for our guys, and no suspensions were forthcoming.

I was pleased to see that John Carlson was up from Hershey, but a bit disappointed as well, since I had seats seven rows back from the Bears' goal for last night's game against the Wilkes Barre/Scranton Penguins (another slaughter), and had been looking forward to his triumphant homecoming.

It would have been nice to see him score on Vesa Toskala, if only to give the Leafs fans one more reason to hate the Hero of Team USA, but he didn't.

Ovechkin had a five-point night (1G, 4A); Knuble tallied a pair of very nice goals, from a total distance of 16' out - though how you can be standing in the paint and be 7' from the goal mouth is beyond me... someone was measuring like a guy again, I think... (Ooops, was that my out-loud voice?), and Flash, Fehr and Poti finished out the scoring.

( The Beast Awards )

12-JAN-2010 - Flew in to Tampa Bay; flight was mostly uneventful, and although having "teh Interwebs" on the airplane was cool (one cool point for AirTran), paying $15 per bag was not (and AirTran loses their cool point). At Tampa Bay International, picked up the World's Ugliest Rental Car (AKA: The Car You Can't Lose Track Of) from the rental folks, and headed to the hotel. Got checked in, went a'wandering in downtown Tampa. Came back, went to dinner at Roaring 20's Pizza and Pipes (about 45 minutes south of Tampa), then went to the game.

( Backstory on dinner... )

Lightning 7, Capitals... not as many

I gotta be honest: we walked out after the first frame. The guys came out flat, and we were exhausted anyway - I'd been working 10-hour shifts all week, and we'd had an early flight in. Did not even look at the score until the next morning... was utterly unsurprised. The Caps looked absolutely wretched during warmups and the first frame. Not gonna say anything else.

13-JAN-2010 - Got up, headed for Miami, via Big Cat Rescue, where we did a 1.5 hour walking tour of the facility, and found out that panthers don't roar; they meow like the "lesser cats."

( Backstory on Big Cat Rescue )

From Big Cat Rescue, we headed down to Miami, where it took us the better part of an hour to find the $LOCATION (sorry, geek stepping in here) where my friend had to install a new switch. She got that done while I wandered around taking pictures (what else would I be doing???), then we headed for the arena.

Capitals 5, Panthers 4 (SO)

What a game we saw! By the end of the 1st, the Caps were down 2-0. By the end of the 2nd, we were down 4-2. And by the end of the 3rd, we were tied 4-4. Theodore was *outstanding* in the shootout, stopping everything he had to stop, and the shootout win went to Tomas Fleischmann, which made me very happy. We got to see a Gordie Howe Hat Trick (a goal, an assist, and a fight) thanks to relative newcomer Jason Chimera, too.

Got back to the hotel after the game, bouncing off the walls, and called it a relatively early night again.

14-JAN-2010 - Got up, headed for Ft. Lauderdale International, and then back to BWI. Slept the entire flight - I don't remember takeoff; I was out before we left the gate. Landed, had lunch, then went and put in an 11-hour workday. Got home, crawled into bed, and did the same on Friday, which made me late for the game, but oh well! I was pleased to see what I saw of it.

All in all, apart from the Lightning disaster of a game, the trip was great fun! :-)

Pictures here!

For the past week at my office, I've been putting in 10-hour days almost every day in preparation for Tuesday-Wednesday-Thursday of this coming week.

Tuesday morning, my hockey buddy and I will fly out of BWI Airport for points south - namely Tampa Bay, Florida, for the Caps-Lightning game. The next day, we'll be driving down to Sunrise for the Caps-Panthers game, and then on Thursday morning, we'll fly back home.

This is the Second Annual January Hockey Pilgrimage.

Last year, we went to Long Island, followed by Ottawa, and it was EFFING cold up there! The washer fluid in my car froze solid, and it snowed. It was really, really yucky. So this year, we decided it would be a run to Sunny Florida...

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( ... )

Today - OK, yesterday now - people in Omsk went to a fight, and a hockey game broke out...

No, really.

There wasn't a hockey game.

Because when the dust had settled from the fight that started up between Brandon Sugden of Vityaz - yes, that Brandon Sugden, formerly of the Washington Capitals' organization - and Alexander Svitov of Avangard Omsk, a whopping 691 penalty minutes had been issued.

691! All in under four minutes of "hockey".

The actual participants, including Jaromir Jagr, and their penalties, are listed ( behind the cut tag... )

In the last two weeks, I have witnessed a transition.

With the trade of Captain Chris Clark and defenseman Milan Jurcina to the Columbus Blue Jackets for left wing Jason Chimera came a day of shock: the Capitals had traded their Captain.

Their first game without Captain Clark was a disaster, when the Carolina Hurricanes - bottom feeders of both the Southeast Division and the entire NHL - handed them a 6-3 loss at the Verizon Center. The Caps would lose their next two games as well, both in California, the first to the San Jose Sharks (5-2), and the second to the Los Angeles Kings (2-1). Then they came home.

The Capitals' first game with Captain Ovechkin - who will now and forever be "Captain Caveman" to me, thanks to an amusing post title over on Japers' Rink - brought a team hungry for the win to tear up the ice of the Verizon Center and win a resounding 4-2 victory over the Montreal Canadiens; their second game was a 5-2 victory over the Ottawa Senators.

And then came tonight. With an 8-1 victory over the Atlanta Thrashers, the Capitals pushed their lead in the Southeast Division to 16 points, and they are poised for the Tuesday-Wednesday matchups with the Tampa Bay Lightning and the Florida Panthers, both of which I will be privileged to attend in person.

The Caps under Ovechkin's leadership have one major thing that they did not under Clark's: snarl. There is a growling beastlike undertone to the team now, one that is as gung ho as its on-the-ice leader. The Capitals, entering the third frame with a 4-1 lead over the Thrashers tonight, poured on the steam and kept pouring, finally humiliating the Thrashers 8-1. They kept their foot firmly on the Thrashers' throat. They are wolves. On both Tuesday night and Thursday night, everyone on the ice jumped to defend his teammate. They were undaunted by fists, unafraid to rough someone up for taking liberties. And they made both the teams from Canada pay for their trouble.

I am proud to witness this transformation. The Caps, to a man, want Lord Stanley's Cup, and they want it now. And I do not believe they will take "not this time" for an answer again.

NHL, beware: the Caps are coming. They are wolves. And they are hungry.

Coach Bruce Boudreau celebrated his 55th birthday tonight with an 8-1 victory over the Atlanta Thrashers. Congratulations, Coach! The victory increases the Caps' lead in the Southeast Division to 16 points, and gives them 60 points in 44 games played, which, I believe, is another Caps record.

At just past the halfway point through the season, the Caps remain a solid 3rd place in the Eastern Conference, behind the New Jersey Devils (63) and the Buffalo Sabres (61), with a 3-point lead over Pittsburgh (57). They lead the league in goals per game, at 3.61, and are second in power play percentage at 23.8% (behind Montreal's 24.6%).

Nine players on the Capitals' roster have scored ten or more goals this season:

Alex Ovechkin (27)
Nicklas Backstrom, Alexander Semin (18)
Tomas Fleischmann (15)
Brooks Laich (11)
Mike Green, Brendan Morrison, Mike Knuble, Eric Fehr (10)

Tomas Fleischmann leads the league with a 22.7 shot percentage.

Alex Ovechkin and Sidney Crosby (PIT) are tied with 27 goals, and the league leaders (Marian Gaborik (NYR) and Patrick Marleau (SJS)) each have 28.

Mike Green, Stephane Robidas (DAL), and Marc-Andre Bergeron (MTL) are tied for first in goals among defenseman, with 10 each, and Green, with 33 assists to his name, leads all defensemen with 43 points; the next-closest defenseman is Duncan Keith (CHI) with 41 points.

As a team, the Capitals have the 4th fewest PIMs per game, at 10.3 average. They also have the 4th fewest PIMs at 442. They have the fewest major penalties in the league, with 12.

Offhand, I'd say Coach Boudreau's Caps are doing very well for themselves this season. It's something he can be proud of. I know I am!

What a trouncing the Caps gave to the hapless Atlanta Thrashers tonight!

The Capitals, with new Captain Alex Ovechkin (AKA "Captain Caveman!") are now 3-0, and the team has gelled into a well-oiled machine.

Goals tonight came from:

1) Mike Knuble (9) (Tom Poti, Jeff Schultz)
2) Alexander Semin (17) (Brooks Laich, Mike Green)
3) Nicklas Backstrom (18) (Mike Green)
4) Mike Knuble (10) (Alex Ovechkin, Jeff Schultz)
5) Alexander Semin (18) (Tomas Fleischmann, Tom Poti)
6) David Steckel (3) (Matt Bradley, Boyd Gordon)
7) Tom Poti (1) (Alexander Semin, Brian Pothier)
8) Jason Chimera (9/1) (Brendan Morrison, Eric Fehr)

Im-pressive!

( More behind the cut tag... )

Tonight's game was very well-played all around (except for the 2nd frame, where the Caps let up on the gas pedal). A very good game, and a convincing win!

( And wings! )

Wow. It's been a crazy couple of months.

Between the rain, and my not wanting to fry another camera, I haven't been doing as much shooting at Caps games lately. The standing joke is, "it's raining? Must be a Caps game tonight." I did take my camera (officially, with permission) to a Bears game a couple of weeks ago, but I didn't get to shoot as much as I would have liked, due to the presence of 8 teenaged girls along for the ride (and my daughter's 14th birthday party).

The *SQUEE!* I got when she unwrapped her autographed Mike Green photo, though, was worth it. :-)

I'll hopefully be able to update again soon. :)

Wow.

Boudreau has got to stop playing Green into the ground.

How Green got the third star of the game tonight is beyond me... how he managed to finish the game on his feet is beyond me, too. Wow. Between all the injuries, and two nasty penalties in a row - Ovechkin and Erskine, within 30 seconds of each other - I'm surprised we made it to overtime.

The Ovechkin penalty was weak.

The Clark penalty? Oh yeah. He did it. He surely did do it.

Great example, Captain Clark. :-p

I'm tired.

I'm upset.

I think I'm going to call it a night.

Good for Beagle on his first NHL goal. Sorry we didn't win.

Brenda L. Allen-Moser, 43 of Terre Haute passed away on Nov. 18, 2009 at Royal Oaks Nursing Home. She was born Dec. 9, 1965 in Terre Haute to Conrad Allen and Marilyn Glasgow Allen. She was a graduate of Terre Haute North Vigo High School. Over the years, she has worked at Wal-Mart, Kroger, and Baskin Robbins. She enjoyed Gaming, music, and the S.C.A. She was a loving and caring wife and daughter and loved all of her family. She was preceded by her paternal grandparents, Conrad E. Allen Sr. and Bessie C. Graham Allen; her maternal grandparents, Lowell O. Glasgow and Laura F. Andrews Glasgow; her brother, Matthew Theodore Allen; her sister, Terry Lynn Allen; and several aunts and uncles. She is survived by her parents; her husband, Daniel Moser whom she married on June 14, 2003; two sisters, Chris Jeffers and husband Don of Terre Haute, and Lisa Allen and partner Thales Exoo of Chicago; two aunts, Carolyn Atkinson of Terre Haute, and Georgianna Bricker and husband Clarence of Terre Haute; one nephew, Donnie Jeffers; one great niece, Caleigh Hedden; several cousins; and her three cats that she loved, Shelly, Thorn, and Florida. Memorial services will be at 1 p.m. Saturday at Greiner Funeral Home, 2005 North 13th Street, Terre Haute, IN 47804 with Visitation from 11 a.m. till service time on Saturday. Cremation is scheduled. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to Shriners Hospitals for Children of St. Louis, or to Zorah Shrine Transportation located at 420 N. 7th St. Terre Haute, IN 47807. Donation envelopes will be available at Greiner Funeral Home.

Obituary, Terre Haute Tribune-Star

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In the days following her second amputation, Brenda's health did not improve. Her dialysis site became infected, and her immune system was not strong enough to withstand the insertion of a second peritoneal tube. In accordance with her wishes, her family elected to discontinue her dialysis and diabetes medication, and Brenda passed away early Wednesday morning.

She will be missed.

Holy COW.

I feel bad for Theodore... poor guy! I hope he's OK. He looked 'off' tonight, and not just because he let in three goals on five shots. :-(

Varlamov? Wow. Holy cow, he had a great night. He plays very well when coming in as relief, in general, and tonight was no exception.

Fleischmann? Six points in as many games. Nicely done! Keep up the goals, Flash!

Semin? Welcome back! Glad to see it!

Green? *wince* Not too bad, but not great either?

Perreault? :-) Mini-AU! #8.5 had a good night, even if he didn't post any numbers.

Captain my Captain, Clark? That shootout goal is why you still wear the big C! Keep it up!

The referees... I think that "boarding" call on Jurcina may be explained by one thing: Gary Bettman was in the house tonight.

And they missed a couple of BIG hooks and interference calls, too. Wow, did they ever.

But a big mark in the W column puts the Caps alone on top of the Eastern Conference.

Take THAT, NHL!

Take THAT!

The Capitals came back from a 3-2 deficit to win 7-3 tonight, and I gotta say... WOW. I am suitably impressed. This is without either Alex Ovechkin -or- Mike Green in the lineup!

I'll post more details on the game later; right now, I am three or four games behind in posting photos, and I need to catch up, but I say it again: WOW. That was some hockey!

Bren came through the surgery well, and they did NOT have to take the hip, just the leg to mid-thigh, so that is excellent news on that front. Thank you all for your continued thoughts and prayers. She's "crazy out of it" right now, according to her sister, but that is most likely to be expected, but things did go better than expected, and that is a tremendous relief.

Please continue to remember her in your thoughts and prayers, though... this is still going to be tremendously rough on her, and she's going to need all the support and the like she can get.

...please spare a thought, a prayer, for my pretty much lifelong friend, Brenda?

She's in the hospital tonight, as she has been, on and off, since mid-August.

And tomorrow, the doctors will amputate her left leg at the hip.

It's been just over two weeks since they took the right leg mid-thigh.

It's all complications of diabetes, and kidney failure.

...

I can't clear my mind to sleep...

To my other diabetic friends: please take care of yourselves? Please?

I swear, it was the gawdawful pink sweaters that caused the three fights in the first frame! The sweaters wouldn't have been all that bad, if the socks didn't match!!!

Don't get me wrong - if I'd had $600-700 to spare, I would probably have gone for Flash's game-worn sweater, pink or no pink! Breast cancer research is a great cause. But grown men should not have to try and play hockey all pretty in pink! And these weren't as horrid as the Valentine's Day ones last season...





In motion, though, the sweaters and socks looked like a fight between Pepto Bismal, bubble gum, denizens of a clown car, and cotton candy. It was rather eye-boggling, to say the least!

Jose Theodore kicked ASS last night!

The rest of the team didn't do so badly, either.

The scoring all came from the top line, but I'm not complaining. Ovechkin (2), Backstrom (1), and Semin (1) combined to bring us another two points in the W column, and Jose Theodore...

Wow. Theo stopped 41 of 43 shots, for a save percentage of .953! Un-frikkin'-BELIEVABLE! One of those stops was a penalty shot awarded (justly, it turns out, from a friend who had access to the replays) to Darroll Powe. The 13' wrister bounced harmlessly off Theodore's shin pads and out of harm's way, and from that moment, there was no stopping the Caps!

Photos are here - camera issues and a late arrival (bad positioning, thank you net) prevented getting as many as I usually do.

Beast Report ( Behind the cut tag )

After the Hershey Bears game on Saturday, I reported that there was a dangerous traffic light on PA 322 at Mushroom Hill Road. It's a blind traffic light - you can't see it until you crest the hill when eastbound on PA 322 - and it is the frequent scene of accidents (like the one I mentioned in my Bears game report).

On Monday, as I said I would, I wrote to PennDOT. PennDOT got back to me and directed me to the municipality. So, I wrote to the municipality. They said that basically there's nothing wrong with the light according to the records they keep. I countered with, "oh no? You go look yourself, then tell me that light's safe!"

We'll see what happens next.

The day started off nicely enough.

We left to drive up to Hershey at around noon, and decided, since we had the time, to divert to Basignani Winery. We did, eventually, find the elusive place, but when we got there, we saw no evidence that it was open, so we got back on the road.

Almost immediately, it started raining.

Those of you who make the drive to Hershey on a regular basis will be well familiar with the traffic light located at the top of a hill near a Wal Mart on PA 322. This traffic light often causes near-pile-ups, because you can't see it until you're over the crest of the hill, and by then, it's frequently too late to do anything but react.

( A Terrifying Moment on PA 322... )

On Monday, I will be writing a letter to the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation about that traffic light. I don't know how many times I've been in a close call there... but this one was the worst. To look back, expecting to have seen a rear-ending, and instead to see a van on its roof... that's something that PennDOT could avoid by putting up a warning sign, and it needs to be done.

Consider this my public service announcement of the day. BE CAREFUL ON 322! There is a traffic light that you cannot see at Mushroom Hill Road. It is VERY dangerous, especially when the road conditions are wet.

After a few more stops, we made our way to the arena. On arrival at Giant Center, we learned that last night was Breast Cancer Awareness Night, and that the Bears would be skating in pink and black sweaters and socks.

( My guess is that had something to do with the three fights in the first frame... )