Capital Pursuit: The Washington Capitals’ Chase For The Stanley Cup: Game 7

The NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs are underway for the playoff teams, including my hometown Washington Capitals. Throughout the playoffs I’ll offer my thoughts & observations on each Caps game after it’s over, today it’s last night’s all-or-nothing Game 7 between the Caps and the New York Rangers.

To quote the incomparable Vin Scully, “The Impossible Has Happened!” Or to better quote it, from an old Bugs Bunny cartoon, “I don’t know how youse done it BUT I KNOW YOUSE DONE IT!” Caps 2, Rangers 1. Caps win series 4-3 after being down 3-1! Didn’t look good after defensive lapses led to an early Rangers goal, but Semin soon tied it up, then with less than 5 minutes to go in the 3rd, the old guard of the team-Sergei Fedorov-showed he still has some left in him scoring what proved to be the series-winning goal, completing the comeback and sending the Caps into the Eastern Conference Semifinals. Unbelievable!

Now that the Quarterfinals are over the NHL re-seeds the remaining teams and based on #1 Boston still being in, we get the 2nd-lowest-seeded remaining team…guess who? Pittsburgh! Rivalry renewed yet again! Crosby & Malkin are coming back to DC, which is going to guarantee fireworks and the matchup we probably all have wanted at some point in these playoffs. I can’t wait! We won’t have enforcer Donald Brashear for most or all the series (suspension for hits leveled in Game 6, he has to sit out 5 more games) but still get an emotional boost from the return of captain Chris Clark, out since January due to injuries.

To my fellow Caps fans, good job so far but we can’t let up yet. Keep coming out and keep ROCKING THE RED! We still need 12 more wins before we can celebrate!

Game 1 is Saturday at 1 PM ET at Washington. The game can be seen on NBC in the US and on CBC in Canada.