Left Handed Larceny

Capital Management
by Eric Berkenpas

Photo cred www.bostonglobe.com

Midway through the month of March, huge question marks were being raised surrounding the once dominant Washington Capitals and their star Alexander Ovechkin. Washington had spent the whole season to that point at or near the bottom of the league and had absolutely nothing going for them. Ovechkin was playing with no heart, Backstrom and Green were non-existent, Mike Ribeiro (the new guy) was the only one producing and they could not find a steady goaltender to put between the pipes. First year coach Adam Oates was likely beginning to question in his mind how much longer George McPhee was going to put up with this. Alex Ovechkin must really want Oates to stick around because starting on March 17th, he took his team on his shoulders and lead his team on a march that has landed them in the top spot in their division and the 3rd spot in the conference. Let's recap this last month in Washington.

Photo cred www.russianmachineneverbreaks.com

On March 17, the Capitals had the severely struggling Buffalo Sabres coming into town. The Capitals were coming off a 4-1 loss at Boston just the night before and were looking to bounce back. Ovechkin opened up the scoring with only his 11th goal of the season and after a wild second period, the Capitals found themselves on the winning side of a 5-3 shootout of a game. Next game up was against their bitter rivals in Pittsburgh. Ovechkin once again opened up the scoring but neither him nor the rest of his team could find the back of the net and they lost a very tightly contested game 2-1. Staring down 8 road games in the next 11, things were not looking good for the Capitals. Ovechkin thought differently as he ripped off 14 goals and 18 points in those 11 games and lead his team to gain points in all but one of them. A team who everyone labeled as down and out and in need of serious answers is now one of the hottest if not THE hottest team in the league right now and is tasked with solidifying that top spot in their division by holding off the Winnipeg Jets who had been enjoying that top spot for quite some time, watching the rest of their division flounder.

Photo cred www.facebook.com

So now you may ask, what changed? While the entire team has been playing better as a whole, the energy and momentum is all centered and flows out from the captain and leader of the Capitals, Alexander Ovechkin. They badly needed him to take the reigns. When you see your captain playing at 50%, it doesn't give much incentive to play with the passion and grit that the Capitals have been known to play with in the past. Something switched in Alex and the whole team is benefiting from it. Thus is the way with super stars. Their teams feed off the energy that they create and while Alex was creating no energy, his team was falling by the wayside. Now that his energy is renewed, his team is renewed and they are reaping the benefits game in and game out. Talks are rising now that Ovechkin could easily capture a Hart Ross at the end of the season if he keeps up this pace when it wasn't long ago that he was being doubled in points by the leader, Sidney Crosby.

Photo cred bigstory.ap.org

The Capitals are a team that no one wants to play right now and definitely not a team anyone wants to see in the playoffs. They are playing with a lot of confidence  and the combination of Ribeiro, Backstrom and Ovechkin on that 1st line is proving to be unstoppable right now. If you are a Capitals fan, congratulations, you have your super star back. If you are a Penguins fan, get ready for the "Who's the best player in the world, Crosby or Ovechkin" discussions to crop up again. If you are a fan of any other team in the East, check your schedule and hope you don't see Washington on it. If you are a fan of a team in the West, sit back and enjoy the show that Ovechkin and his Capitals are putting on, but don't rest too easy because at this pace, the Capitals could well find themselves battling for a Stanley Cup. Dominating hockey is back in Washington and I couldn't think of a better thing to happen to the NHL than one of it's best players revive his career. The NHL missed you, Alex, and certainly missed goals like this: