Goodbye, Cruel Year

I am trying to think of an uglier hockey game that I have seen, and nothing is coming up. Not just the way the two teams played, which was pretty unimpressive on both ends. That may have been one of the most poorly officiated games I've ever seen. From penalizing Brashear after sticking up for one of his teammates who had been on the recieving end of an unpenalized hit from behind all the way to the unacceptably lenient punishment doled out to Colton Orr. (To be fair, they were pretty crappy in the Caps favor as well.) That third period was a perfect example of something the NHL needs to get rid of if it ever has any aspirations of getting anywhere near the same level of respect as the other major sports.

As for the Caps' play, I don't have much to say. They were unable to establish any sort of consistent forecheck or get shots to the net. It is not a coincidence that the Caps have run into a string of "hot" goalies over the course of the current losing streak. Lundqvist wasn't particularly impressive, but the Caps didn't really make him work. For all the flu-induced inexperience on the backline, the offense seems to be proving just as troublesome of late.

More importantly, I'm sick. I slept through the first period, and so far, this entire recap has been nothing but a series of unrelated sentences. So I'm going to go ahead and cut it short now. Have a happy New Year, don't do anything too stupid, and I'll see you back here in 2007.

Recaps From People That Matter
-A View From the Cheap Seats
-The Peerless Prognosticator