The Two-Line Pass

The Lead

Yes, yes, Alex Ovechkin returned to the Washington Capitals lineup tonight and, him being the no-talent bum that he is, it took him over 15 minutes of game time to score a goal! What a stiff. Ovechkin celebrated his return by letting Matt Bradley be the baddest-assed dude on the ice.

See, Bradley is that dude in the above photo, covered in blood because he got cut open above his left eye in a fight with Aaron Voros. And I think he missed like two shifts while he got stitched up and changed his jersey which was, by the time he got to the dressing room, also quite bloody.

But the fight was important because the Caps were getting bullied by a fairly mediocre Ranger side who had the lead thanks to a goal from, who else, Marian Gaborik. So Bradley took the initiative and, despite looking like he got his ass kicked by a punk like Voros, turned the entire tide of the game. Ovechkin’s goal leveled for the Caps, and Brooks Laich put them ahead 2-1 near the end of the second period.

But Gaborik scored again (his 15th, same as Ovechkin, except Gabby ain’t missed no games.. yet) and it fell, once again, to Bradley to save the day. So when Jay Beagle dispossessed the Rangers’ puckholder in the right corner of the Caps’ defensive zone and shoveled it up to the blue line, it was Bradley who was there to pester Wade Redden.

Interesting thing about Redden, by the way: I am somewhat convinced there are any number of people that New York Rangers fans would rather have on their blue line than him. Several of the people I imagine are on this list are crippled. Because he saw the puck coming toward him a few strides’ worth of space ahead of Bradley and he did what you’d imagine he’d do. He panicked. So Bradley poked the puck away from him and skated past him as if he weren’t there, broke in alone on Henrik Lundqvist, who badly misread the play, and scored.

Matt Bradley almost made everyone forget Alex Ovechkin tonight. I guess that’s not bad at all.

Elsewhere…

Montreal 3, Carolina 2 (SO)

Carey Price made some kinda retardo save on Matt Cullen (around :48 in) to keep the ‘Canes scoreless in the shootout and hand them their first loss since that big, big W on Sunday. So much for that win streak, eh?

Ottawa 3, Toronto 2

I’m sorry, I just cannot be bothered to care about the goddamn Battle of Ontario any more. I physically cannot bring myself to do it. Two submediocre teams playing mediocre hockey before a largely pro-Leafs crowd every game for the past three years and until forever. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Shut up, no one cares.

Nashville 4, San Jose 3

Nashville four. Nash ville four. Nashvillefour. Nash villefour. Na shville four. Nashville.. four? No, no matter which way I say it, it still sounds really freaking odd and off-putting.

Colorado 3, Calgary 2

A short list of things that are irritating me more than Calgary’s power play right now: 1) …. That is all.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 18th, 2009 at 1:35 am and is filed under Good night. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.