| Page 2 of 2 < |
Caps' Scoring Woes Continue As They Falter Against Flyers
Tomas Fleischmann, left, gets the puck past Antero Niittymaki in the first period. The Capitals came out swinging, but Philadelphia wore them down.
(Toni L. Sandys - The Post)
TOOLBOX
   Resize
COMMENT
 Discussion Policy
 CLOSE
Comments that include profanity or personal attacks or other inappropriate comments or material will be removed from the site. Additionally, entries that are unsigned or contain "signatures" by someone other than the actual author will be removed. Finally, we will take steps to block users who violate any of our posting standards, terms of use or privacy policies or any other policies governing this site. Please review the full rules governing commentaries and discussions. You are fully responsible for the content that you post.
Who's Blogging  |
"It's the same thing we've been dealing with for a few weeks now," Capitals defenseman Brian Pothier said. "It's just untimely penalties, not capitalizing on our opportunities and them taking advantage of a mistake."
Part of the problem is a roster that was again missing Chris Clark, Alexander Semin and Tom Poti, all out with injuries. Unlike deeper teams, the Capitals cannot withstand injuries to significant players. Those three accounted for 74 goals last season.
Yet Hanlon and his players have steadfastly refused to use injuries as an excuse, even after being shut out for the first time this season, 2-0, in New York on Thursday. But, Hanlon cautioned, it could become a problem if the injuries turn out to be long-term ailments.
It remains unclear how much more time the three will miss.
The Capitals will take today off and return to the ice for practice tomorrow, at which time the injured players will be reevaluated. But Hanlon said he was not hopeful to have any of them back for the start of the three-game road trip that begins Monday at Carolina.
The first period last night might have been the most entertaining period played at Verizon Center this season. And that was before Richards and Brooks Laich began trading haymakers.
Washington seemed to feed off the intensity and eventually took a 1-0 lead on Fleischmann's goal.
The play began with Michael Nylander (two assists) feeding a pass through the crease. Fleischmann swooped in from the doorstep and whacked a deflected puck out of midair past Niittymaki at 7:29.
But the Capitals couldn't keep pace in the second period and found themselves in a familiar position: taking unneeded penalties. In all, they took 10 penalties to the Flyers' six.
Briere's goal at 8:03 tied the score at 1 and Richards scored the go-ahead goal at 15:52 on a play that began at the opposite end with an outstanding save by Niittymaki, whose pad save sent a long rebound onto the stick of teammate Joffrey Lupul. Lupul sent the puck ahead to Richards, who beat Kolzig's glove hand with a wrist shot.
Umberger's third-period power-play goal turned out to be the winner. The powerful forward fired a low, hard shot from the circle past Kolzig.
"Everybody, to a man, has to look in the mirror and ask, 'What could I have done better, did I give everything I could tonight?" Kolzig said. "If the answer is no, you figure out what you need to do extra to get us over the hump."
