This young Caps team is showing some wrinkles in this preseason, and I'm not referring to elder statesmen Federov and Nylander. Bruce Boudreau has been trotting out a decidedly different looking penalty kill these days. I had to do a double-take at the sight of Ovechkin and Alex Semin logging minutes on the PK. Initial impressions from my first two glances at this experiment ( home game against Carolina) weren't so positive as they both resulted in a Caps goalie fishing the puck out of the back of the net.
Seriously, wasn't there a time when Semin need to stop and ask directions to the defensive zone? And he's on the PK??!
Since then I've seen OV deposit a couple of shorties (the most demoralizing thing a team can do) and I've seen some gloriously entertaining puck "ragging" which relegated the other team's power play into spectators like me. So is this experiment a good idea or not?
Not.
All the conformation I needed for this was provided in the last preseason game when, in a panic-inducing moment, Alex Ovechkin went down after a Bruin's shot tattooed him. (Thankfully he bounced back up) It's a high risk position to put your best offensive players in. And while, if it were me, this experiment would not translate into the regular season- I totally love the stones that Boudreau has to try it.
And it sure makes things more interesting...
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1 comment:
great blog mike. ill be sure to check back often and tell my friends about it. Keep up the good work.
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