My Condolences is a running group of articles looking at teams eliminated from the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Only one team gets to take home Lord Stanley for the summer, the other fifteen teams get absolutely nothing, except a mention in this article…
My Condolences to the….
Washington Capitals
Wow, I can not believe the Washington Capitals lost a game 7 at home, bringing back their true title, not Stanley Cup champions, but Stanley Cup chokers. My condolences to the Washington Capitals. Winning back to back championships is so hard in today's NHL. So many things need to work out right for a team, and sometimes the overall crunch of back to back postseason can catch up to a team.
I have to confess, I already started to write my condolences to the Carolina Hurricanes, figuring there was no way Washington would give up a 2-0 lead in a game 7 at their home stadium. Wow. Not only did Washington blow a game 7 at home they also failed to eliminate Carolina in game 6 in Carolina. The playoffs do not give many opportunities to eliminate a team, you need to capitalize when you can. A lot needs to work out to win a playoff series, the injury to TJ Oshie definitely did not help the team, Braden Holtby giving up a weak goal on the Caps power play did not help the team, and Todd Reirden did not help the team. There have been a lot of compelling stories this postseason. New York managed to make the second round of the playoffs, without John Tavares.
One of the biggest reasons they went to round 2 was head coach Barry Trotz who knows if Trotz was still in Washington maybe the Caps would be going to round 2.
My condolences to the Washington Capitals, except I do not think they need them. Alex Ovechkin looked just fine after losing game 7. To me, it looks like the Caps did not have the drive this season having finally won the cup last year. We will see what next year brings for the Caps.