The Daily Feed

Caps top Blue Jackets, suffer on the blue line

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courtesy of ‘bridgetds’

The Caps want to start tuning up for the playoffs. After grinding out an 4-3 overtime victory against the Blue Jackets on Thursday at Verizon Center, they have 101 points, eight points more than the Lightning in the division with four to play (six for Tampa).

Washington trails the Flyers by a point for the top overall seed in the Eastern Conference and home ice through to the Stanley Cup Finals. The Presidents’ Cup is out of reach as the Canucks have it all but mathematically wrapped up. So, the Caps are more or less looking at a No. 2 seed heading into the playoffs with a possible No. 1 and it is time to fine tune the program so as to vanquish the ghosts of playoffs past.

Or so you would think.

Bob McKenzie, one of the elite reporters in all of hockey, tweeted during the Caps game on Thursday that defenseman Dennis Wideman was in the hospital with a hematoma on his leg that developed after an awkward hit from Carolina’s Tuomo Ruutu on Tuesday.

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Sports Fix, The Features

Capitals revamped defense: Stanley Cup worthy?

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courtesy of ‘bridgetds’

Nine straight games.

Pretty good for a team that folk said was in complete disarray and out of the Stanley Cup picture three months ago. The Caps current streak now exceeds its lowest point of the season, the eight-game losing streak in December that led up to the Winter Classic. The highest high is now greater than the lowest low.

And Washington is looking to get higher.

The questions have been about the offense. Why haven’t they been scoring? What is wrong with Ovie? Traditionally though, with this group and this coach, scoring has not been a problem and the Caps are showing signs of getting out of the doldrums that plagued them throughout the middle of the season in the scoring department. The defense this year has been surprisingly competent in front of young, solid goaltending. Through the nine-game win streak, Washington has given up 13 goals for an impressive 1.44 goals against per game.

The question becomes – can these new defensive dynamics lead the Caps to the Promised Land?

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The Daily Feed

Sturm, Wideman, Arnott does not a Stanley Cup make

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courtesy of ‘bridgetds’

The deadline has passed. The contenders have loaded up. Plans have been made for the future, be it long-term team architecture or the short term with eyes on playing some extended Spring Hockey.

And Dennis Wideman and Marco Sturm along with Jason Arnott have made their way to D.C.

In many ways this makes a lot of sense.

But does it?

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capitals hockey, Sports Fix

Looking at the Caps’ 2011 Trade Deadline Day

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courtesy of ‘bridgetds’

So the NHL Trade Deadline has come and gone, and the Washington Capitals made the most of it. Truth be told, the Caps started a few days ago, acquiring Marco Sturm off waivers from Los Angeles, and then added two new pieces of the current puzzle yesterday. Dennis Wideman joined the blue line corps early in the day, and the biggest catch came at the buzzer with the Caps announcing the acquisition of center Jason Arnott from New Jersey.

Do the Caps believe they’re ready for the post season with these three players? Caps management seems to think so. Let’s break it all down and see if we agree. Continue reading