Bishop – Friends in Cold Places

Caps Zap the Bolts

Written by Renee Garces

Photos by Brittney Marcum

It was an electric night in the phone booth as the Washington Capitals battled the Tampa Bay Lightning to take the lead and the win. The game started out defensively, no shots on goal until Alex Ovechkin gets one at the 6:23 mark. Tampa Bay forward Alex Killorn scores on the Bolts’ first shot on goal, 1-0, at the 8:18 mark of the first period.

The speed of the game only increased from there.

Caps captain Alex Ovechkin was fired up for the game, hitting and shooting the puck. At the 6:54 mark of the second period, Andrej Sustr makes it 2-0 Tampa. Bolts captain, Steven Stamkos, ended his longest ever goal drought with a blast past Braden Holtby, 3-0. For the first time this season, Holtby was pulled from the goal crease and Philipp Grubauer comes in relief.

On the power play, thanks to a Stamkos slash, Ovechkin takes a pass from T.J. Oshie and puts the Caps on the board, 3-1.

In the third period, Matt Niskanen just destroys J.T. Brown in open ice. A big save by Grubauer denies the Bolts, and then Oshie rips one past Bishop, 3-2. On the power play, again, Ovi buries one and the game became tied 3-3. Marcus Johansson scores his sixth of the season on the power play and the Caps suddenly have a 4-3 lead with 5:44 left in the game. MoJo’s goal happened because of beautiful passing from Oshie and Ovechkin.

Oshie ices the win with an empty net goal, assisted by Nicklas Backstrom and Ovechkin. With that assist, Backstrom collects his 600th NHL point. Caps win 5-3 and now, because they have a game in-hand on the Dallas Stars, have the best record in the league.

Milestones

A career milestone for Jason Chimera, who played in his 900th career NHL game tonight.

Nicklas Backstrom picked up his 600th career point in 605 games.

Alex Ovechkin with his two PP goals and two assists had his 101st career multi-goal game.

Upcoming

Caps will hold practice on Saturday at 11:30 at Kettler IcePlex.

Next game: Sunday 20 December NY Rangers. Game time 7 pm. View on CSN-DC, NHLN-US, and MSG

Monday 21 December Carolina Hurricanes at 7 pm. View on CSN-DC and FoxSports-CR

Read more by Renne on her personal blog, Between the Blue Lines

Visiting Tampa Bay Amalie Arena, Home of the Lightning

What does one do when they are on vacation and away from their favorite hockey team? You visit rivals in their stadiums and make comparisons! This is our first article in a series about NHL stadiums/arenas that we will write about as we visit them.

The Atmospherics

Amalie Arena is electric—from the outside in. No, really. It is ELECTRIC! There are actual lightning bolts coming down from the ceiling. And the fan energy was pretty impressive too. The pump-up begins before the fans even walk through the doors. There is a bar which serves just about anything you could want to drink and a couple of food trucks with plentiful options in the outdoor pavillion. Get a drink and then roam around the outside promenade (Note: you CAN also bring your drink from outside into the arena with you.) The night we attended a Kings-Bolts game there was a championship winning high school band performing and then the Lightning Girls put on a show to piped in music. When it was time to open the doors there was a big countdown which was rather exciting! Continue reading “Visiting Tampa Bay Amalie Arena, Home of the Lightning”

Caps Daily Glass Bump: Nov 27, 2015

The Caps did not have practice this morning as we have an early start for today’s game: 5 pm at the Verizon Center. The Caps have back-to-back games with a matchup in Toronto Saturday night, so the team will not have practice Saturday, and are scheduled to have Sunday off. They will return to Kettler Monday.

The Bolts have headed north after a hard-fought OT-Shoot-out match against the LA Kings. Undoubtedly the match to watch is that between goalies. Ben Bishop is proving he is every bit the net beast as Braden Holtby (6’2”, 217lb). Bishop had 37 saves through overtime. He’s a big guy himself (6’7”, 214lb) who fills up the net. He has a save percentage of .929 and a Goals Against Average (GAA) of 1.99 compared to Holtby’s 9.24 save percentage and 1.95 GAA. Bishop ranks third in GAA while Holtby owns the second spot in the league behind Henrik Lundquist.