Caps-Habs Observations

Washington and Montreal played an early matinee today at Le Centre Bell, with the Capitals winning 5-4 in OT. I have warm feelings towards both of those organizations, so I tuned in.

Alexander Ovechkin had a couple goals today. I love watching him play...his enthusiasm for the game is extraordinary, and he always looks like he's having fun. He has a bit of Martin Grammatica in him, seeming to celebrate every goal as if it were an overtime game-winner.

Oh, and let's not forget that he's capable of feats like this. Still one of the standout individual efforts of all time, I would say...


Goalies

Highly-regarded Canadiens rookie Carey Price had a bad game today. He looked shaky all day and gave up one really awful goal. It happens to every goalie, of course (except maybe Marty Brodeur), so we'll have to see how the kid bounces back.

Speaking of goalies, Olaf Kolzig seems like he's been in the league so long that you'd bet his first game in Montreal was against the Maroons. Curious, I looked it up...his first year in the league was the '89-90 season. That's before the Sharks even existed, folks. And all of it with the Capitals.


Logos

Speaking of the Caps, it's nice to see that they're back to what I consider their "classic" logo, having moved away from that lame, tepid eagle-thing they had for a while.


TV

The feed for this game was the one from Washington, and the broadcast periodically visited the set of Redskins Live! during intermissions, et cetera, for a few words about the upcoming Redskins-Seahawks playoff game. After the third period, we stopped by again, and the Redskins Live! studio crew could not hide their irritation that a hockey game had had the cheek to go into overtime, thus curtailing their scheduled ninety minutes of pregame show by five, or possibly as many as ten minutes.

I understand that ice hockey is a niche sport. I understand that the eyes of the DC sporting world are firmly fixed on the NFL playoffs, and that's cool. (I'll probably watch some of that game myself). But I think that those in the American sport media for whom nothing matters but NFL football could ease back on the arrogance juuuuuust a little bit, and probably be none the worse for wear.

(For the record, the hockey game ended at 3:02 PM Eastern, delaying the scheduled start of Redskins Live! by 120 seconds...)