Rangers Put Caps in a 2-0 Hole

WASHINGTON -- What a difference a week makes.

One week ago, after the Washington Capitals ended their regular season with a desultory 7-4 loss to the Florida Panthers, things couldn't have looked better.

Thanks to a late season slump on the part of the New Jersey Devils, the Caps had slipped into second place overall in the Eastern Conference. Their opponent: the New York Rangers, a team that the Caps had dealt with rather easily, posting a 3-0-1 record against them during the regular season.

But if one thing is clear after the Rangers have taken a 2-0 lead in this playoff series, it's that these are not the same New York Rangers that the Capitals faced during the regular season -- not by a long shot.

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So what's happened here? How in the world has a team that finished 10 points behind the Capitals in the regular season standings and struggled all year long to win games in regulation now have a hammerlock on a series against a team that just about everyone in the hockey world favored to win and win easily?

On the surface, the changes are fairly obvious. The Rangers team that the Caps faced during the regular season, didn't have Nik Antropov, Derek Morris and Sean Avery in the lineup. But perhaps most important of all, this club didn't have former Stanley Cup-winning head coach John Tortorella behind the bench either. It seems pretty clear that he knew exactly what sort of gameplan the Rangers had to execute against Washington in order to win. Thus far, it's clear that Tortorella and his staff are working that plan to perfection.

The game's only goal came at 7:44 of the first period when Brandon Dubinsky sprung Markus Naslund and Ryan Callahan on a two-on-one break against surprise Washington starter in goal, Simeon Varlamov. With Washington defenseman Tom Poti back deep all along, Naslund put a perfect pass onto Callahan's stick and he wristed it past Varlamov for the only goal the Rangers would need all afternoon.



On that shift, the Caps simply stayed out on the ice too long. You can tell just by watching Alex Ovechkin, as he simply didn't have enough gas left to get back in the play on the backcheck, just one of the the critical breakdowns that allowed Callahan to skate down the right wing unmolested for the goal.

So what happened the rest of the way? Put simply, the Rangers played perfect positional hockey, denying time and space to players like Ovechkin and Alexander Semin. And when those players were able to get off any shots, the Rangers continued to show the willingness to pay the price in order to win, blocking 29 shots. Time and again the Rangers demonstrated that they wanted to win that much more, winning the little battles along the boards and in front of the net and playing the sort of physical playoff hockey that has knocked the Caps off their game.

"We blocked a lot of shots," said Rangers goalie Henrik Lunqvist. "A lot of guys sacrificed their bodies in a series like this. We had a lot of blocks in the first game -- especially on faceoffs. Tonight, again, a couple of blocks where they had pretty good shots. We did a lot of good things. I think these first two games have been really focussed, and we're minimized our mistakes. And that's been the difference," Lundqvist said.

One signature play that the Capitals have sprung all season long is hitting defenseman Mike Green with a back door pass as he streaks to the goal from the right wing point. But after two games, we've yet to see that play in the series. "A lot of our shots were coming from the outside," said Green. "But rebounds were coming to spots where we should be, and we just weren't there to see it."

"We want to keep them to the outside as much as we can," said Rangers defenseman Wade Redden. "Hank came up with some big saves for us again. We held on. It was great to get that win,"

"It's the playoffs and you got to sacrifice your body. Our guys did a great job of that tonight," said Rangers forward Brandon Dubinsky. "You got to do that against a team like that. They're going to shoot everything."

After the game, Ovechkin was trying his level best to fight off the sad reality that his team is in a 2-0 hole. "We have opportunity to bounce back and we have to use that opportunity. It is going to be a hard road trip, but we have to figure out our mind and try to win the game. Try to score goals and win the game. That is what it is all about."

So if you're the head coach of the Washington Capitals, is there anything at all that you have to do differently to win Game Three and get your team back in the series? Even Caps head coach Bruce Boudreau seemed to be at a loss for answers. When asked what was wrong with his team's play on Saturday, Boudreau said, "I can't think of any faults. I thought they played a good hockey game, I thought we played a good hockey game."

"Usually, when either team works that hard for twenty minutes there might be a lull. I didn't see any lulls in either team. It was just two teams playing extremely hard," said Boudreau.



Safe to say, the mood here in Washington is pretty glum. With 7:39 remaining, a significant portion of the crowd started heading to the exits early to beat the traffic. After the game, as the press gaggle waited to get access to the Washington locker room, Caps owner Ted Leonsis made his way through the scrum looking as depressed as I have ever seen him in his decade owning the team.

Over and above the 2-0 hole the team is staring at after a wildly successful regular season, there are plenty of other reasons to be worried. Making the switch to Varlamov from Theodore was wildly welcomed by the home crowd, but now that Boudreau has made the switch, he's going to have to ride the rookie for the rest of the way unless he falters badly. Meanwhile, folks need to remember that Theodore has another full season remaining on his contract, and another full season to mull over the fact that when the chips are down, his coach doesn't have any confidence in him.

It's also easy to remember that Washington General Manager George McPhee stood pat at the deadline. And now that the playoffs are here, it's also easy to see that the Washington lineup is missing something when it comes to grit and sandpaper. At the deadline, plenty of players like Bill Guerin and Steve Montador were available with just those sort of qualities, yet McPhee declined to pursue them, in part because the team simply had little to no room to work with under the salary cap.

As for the Rangers, Game Three Monday night at Madison Square Garden probably can't come fast enough, with an opportunity to put the Caps down 3-0. "We need to be ready to play Game Three," said Tortorella. I don't doubt that the Rangers will be. For the moment at least, all of the unanswered questions are being asked on Washington's side of the ice.