AJC > Sports > Thrashers > Blog > Archives > 2007 > November > 21
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Caps could be dangerous
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Dangerous game tonight for the Thrashers. You have a Washington team that was taken to task at practice yesterday, and is pretty desperate heading into tonight’s game. They’re starting to get healthy with Semin back. It’s absolutely crucial that the Thrashers get off to a good start. The Capitals are 1-10-1 when they don’t score first.
But that being said, Washington is struggling. After a hot start, including that convincing win over the Thrashers in the season opener, the Capitals dropped to 0-5-1 against division opponents in their last six games. By contrast, the Thrashers have really taken advantage of this stretch of division games to leap back into the division race. The Thrashers were 4-9 at the outset of this stretch of eight consecutive games against Southeast opponents. And now they’re .500. Honestly? I didn’t see that coming. To think that they could have a winning record on Thanksgiving is a real testament to the team. When we sat here and predicted their record in the eight-game stretch on this blog, I think the most optimistic projections had them at 6-2. Now, that may still be the case after tonight, but I think Don Waddell and company would accept 6-2 after all is said and done.
We were talking about this Washington team at the morning skate and how they have some similarities to the Thrashers a few years back. There’s good, young talent, a superstar Russian winger and maddening inconsistency. They should steal a move from the Thrashers playbook, bring in Bob Hartley to whip them into shape, and see what happens. Wouldn’t that be fun to face Hartley eight times a year (although that’s about to change)? But you won’t find a nicer person in coaching than Glen Hanlon, so I wouldn’t want it to come to that.
The Capitals are shaking up the lines a bit tonight, so we’ll see if that sparks them against the Thrashers. Tarik El-Bashir reported in the Washington Post that Viktor Kozlov is returning to center Ovevchkin and Clark on the top line. The second line is Fleischmann, Nylander and Semin. Rookie Nicklas Backstrom will center Pettinger and Laich on the third line. The pairings will also be mixed up, but you couldn’t possibly care about that, could you?
The Thrashers? Same old, same old. The way things are going, I wouldn’t change much either. Johan Hedberg is in goal, and your two scratches are Haydar and McCarthy. I will go on record as saying I thought this would be a good spot for Ondrej Pavelec. He looked great against Washington last time he played them, and I wouldn’t want him sitting too long. Plus you can pace Moose a little bit. But I understand the other side, you don’t mess with what’s working.
If you were at the last Thrashers home game, Don Waddell is giving you partial credit for the penalty kill after Marian Hossa’s diving penalty. He said the constant booing lit a fire under the team and they really responded. It was a pretty loud crowd for a Monday, so nice work.
And for those of you who yell “Shoot” during the power play, Bobby Holik is with you. He said this morning that he thought there was too much passing going on in the power play, and that they’re trying to be a little too perfect. So if you see more shooting on the power play tonight, maybe Bobby convinced the rest of his teammates he was right.
