nhl-playoffs Page 8 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

This Is Evgeny Kuznetsov's Time
Before Game 4, a reporter spotted in Evgeny Kuznetsov’s locker a bottle of Fuck Off pills. It’s a gag gift—you know the sort of thing—even if I’m not sure exactly what the gag is supposed to be. But, uh, it might’ve worked. Because Kuznetsov went the fuck off, racking up four assists in the Capitals...

The Golden Knights Have Lost Their Mojo
There is no secret to what is happening to the Golden Knights, now down 3-1 in the Stanley Cup final after playing nigh-unbeatable throughout the playoffs. The zamboni has transformed back into a pumpkin, and not just a regular pumpkin, but a gross smelly rotted one. ...

The Capitals Finally Made Vegas Look Like An Expansion Team<em></em>
In the follow-up performance to a Game 3 loss marked by defensive miscommunications and mishaps, the Vegas Golden Knights looked even worse for most of Game 4, falling to the Capitals 6-2 to go down 3-1 in the Stanley Cup Finals. On the whole, Vegas actually did a better job of creating dangerous ch...

Maybe It Actually Is Okay For Caps Fans To Believe?
The Caps were still up by a goal after Braden Holtby’s incredible blunder in the third period of Saturday’s Game 3, but when it happened—the very instant Tomáš Nosek guided Holtby’s blind, panicked, incomprehensibly ill-advised give-away into the empty net—a vision of the next great gut-wrenching Ca...

Braden Holtby Made The Save Of His Life
If you have not yet seen Braden Holtby’s game-saving save with two minutes left in Washington’s 3-2 Game 2 win, well, first see Alex Ovechkin’s reaction on the bench:...

The Capitals Refused To Blink In Game 2
The Golden Knights have trained people to believe that they’re always going to bounce back. All though this postseason, Vegas has shrugged off potentially game-changing goals from their opponents, like Tom Wilson’s tiebreaker in the third period of Game 1, and quickly reasserted control. But in a 3-...

Tom Wilson Is At It Again
I’m so annoyed that after the pure mainline rush that was Game 1, I have to think about Tom Wilson’s dirty-ass play. Imagine how Jonathan Marchessault feels:...

Embrace The Spectacle Of Stupid Fun Hockey
They have been telling us for decades—a necessarily nebulous “they,” but one that includes the NHL itself, needing to sell the present brand of hockey shaped by rule changes and coaching revolutions and swollen goalie gear, and certain fans, trying to convince themselves that we’re watching the peak...

The Knights' Game 1 Win Was Batshit Crazy Vegas Style<em></em><em></em>
In the world capital of entertainment, Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals in Vegas went far beyond the value of any other ticket you could buy in town. With a 6-4 win over the Capitals, the Vegas Golden Knights weathered the lows, provided some ecstatic highs, and pulled out a dramatic victory on home...

BONK
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Nothing Matters But Now
It’s a funny thing. Year after year you’re told “this is your year,” and it never is, and then, finally, when no one thinks you matter anymore ... it might be your year....

The Capitals Rained Fire On The Lightning<em></em>
It was a dream start for the Washington Capitals tonight—or for any team on the road in a Game 7. Just a minute into the deciding match-up of the Eastern Conference Finals against the Lightning, the Caps’ all-time best player dramatically announced his importance. On a cross-ice pass from Tom Wilson...

Braydon Coburn Made The Mistake Of Trying To Fight Tom Wilson<em></em>
A small scrap in the first period of the Capitals-Lightning Game 7 sent Tampa’s Braydon Coburn and Washington’s Tom Wilson to the box for two minutes each. When that time was up, Wilson wanted to escalate the violence, and Coburn foolishly decided to try and stand his ground in an old-fashioned hoc...

I'm In Awe Of This Nicklas Backstrom Pass
“That was pretty much a perfect game,” Devante Smith-Pelly said after the Capitals’ convincing 3-0 win to take the Lightning to a Game 7, and, yup. The offense was relentless, the defense was suffocating, and Braden Holtby was impenetrable when tested. (Smith-Pelly had a hell of a game himself, scor...

The Capitals Were Finally Flawless
It wasn’t Andrei Vasilevsky’s fault, but it’s hard to beat perfection. The Tampa Bay Lightning goaltender stopped 31 of 33 Capitals shots tonight in Washington’s 3-0 win over the Bolts in Game 6. Several of those saves were spectacular—though unsurprising for anyone who had seen Vasilevsky’s previou...

Collateral Damage
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Dead Letters: Golden Knights Edition
Subject: Had to buy depends...

Holy Crap, The Golden Knights
“We’ll be pretty good in three years and we’ll make a run in five or six,” predicted Golden Knights owner Bill Foley back in August. “This team isn’t going to have more than a dozen regulation wins,” predicted some dummy. This was, to put it as plainly as I can—and it’s a sentiment that wouldn’t hav...

Alex Ovechkin Has Been Eating This Carb Nightmare Before Every Home Game For 13 Years
Partly it’s superstition, and partly it’s because, as they say, he likes what he likes, Alex Ovechkin eats the exact same thing a few hours before every Capitals home game, and he’s been eating it since his rookie year. Athletes really are different from the rest of us....

The Lightning Power Play Is A Thing To Behold
The numbers are intimidating. The Tampa Bay Lightning had the league’s third best power play during the regular season, at 23.9 percent. They have the best power play of any team left alive, at 30.8 percent. They are 6-of-14 on the power play against the Capitals. They have scored a power-play goal ...