My quick thoughts:

• The first period had the Capitals coming out with something to prove; there was only 6:30 left in the first period before the Canes could get the puck, work it into the offensive zone, and get a shot on goal off, and shots in the first period were a fairly stunning 14-2 in favor of the Capitals.  This possession hockey style is really starting to pay off for the players and coaching staff; I’m surprised they didn’t move to it sooner, because even the players already on the roster are thriving under the new system.  Whether that’s because they finally have some centers who can skate the puck (ex. “Oh, there’s Nylander holding onto the puck… again”), or the blueline is a year older and a season more experienced and can ease the pressure on the forwards, I don’t know.
• Cam Ward looked sharper than he did in their opener, and you can’t begrudge any goalie 2 goals on thirty-odd shots.  Still, if the ‘Canes are going to come out this lifeless every night, he’s going to have to get even sharper to keep them in contention in the Southeast.
• The new Capitals home red jerseys look astonishingly sharp on the ice; the numbers are easy to read even from above the blimps, and they look fantastic in action.
• The wasted 4-minute power play was a little painful; Poti should have kept the puck in at the blueline a little more often, but that will come as the chemistry improves on the power play.
• The penalty kill looked great, especially in the first.  The Capitals are doing a great job of shutting down the lanes early in the game, although they seemed to be underpursuing a little in the third.  Again, this brings up the worrying prospect of a conditioning issue (although they didn’t look like they were sucking wind late).
• Ovechkin has somehow spent the summer turning himself into a fantastic two-way player.  He’s still not going to be a replacement blueliner, but with his back-checking on Friday and his shot-blocking and hitting last night, he’s showing that this could be the season that he finally matures from premier offensive threat into the one player you have to watch all the time when he’s on the ice, no matter what the situation.
• Speaking of Ovechkin, I was pretty skeptical at the beginning of camp that there was enough chemistry between Ovechkin and Kozlov to justify playing Kozlov at first-line center, but a few more games like that and I’ll be a believer.  The drop-pass to Ovechkin for his goal was a thing of beauty, and Kozlov can skate it around the zone when he needs to (although not as well as Nylander).

Coming out of this game seeing the Capitals with a 2-0-0 record, I’m a lot more optimistic than I was even after their first win over the Thrashers.  I’m still skeptical of Florida as a threat this year, so once the Capitals show they can bring the game to the Lightning and dominate them, I’ll be ready to start thinking of them as the team to beat in the Southeast.

• Center Ice Online is going to be fantastic, when it actually works. Missed about five minutes of the start of the 1st in Canadiens at Hurricanes because of ‘technical difficulties’, and the broadcast of Senators at Leafs didn’t start for me until a few minutes in. But once it got going, it was smooth sailing; I was able to watch both games side by side via wireless. Not as much of a battery hog as I thought either; I was able to watch the first two periods of the Canes game and the first of the Toronto game on my laptop battery before having to adjourn back to the hotel from the bar. Quality is pretty good, and the audio keeps sync with the video surprisingly well (although I’m going to have to brush up on my French for these Canadian broadcasts).
• The Canadiens snaked one away from the ‘Canes at home. Cam Ward isn’t playing up to the level he needs to be right now, although he could have been getting more help in front.
• The ice at the RBC Center looked terrible in the third; a lot of guys were losing footing in both offensive zones, although it worked out well for the Canadiens (who scored their overtime winner on a falling-down pass to Koivu).
• Speaking of Koivu, he’s coming out of the gate looking fantastic, with two goals tonight, including that winner that he slotted past Cam Ward on the 4-on-3 power play in OT.
• The Senators are looking pretty good despite being down 3-2 in the 3rd. Their big guns are getting chances, but the Leafs have clung on and managed to sneak the shots in often enough to stay ahead. They still have time to pull it even, and I would hardly be surprised; with Ducks-Wings going to the shootout, we’re going to start the North American season with at least three very close games. (Edit: What did I say? Heatley capitalizes on a great pass for his first goal of the season to tie things up. He looks to be worth all those first picks in fantasy so far, not to mention the new deal he just signed.)  (Edit 2:  Heatley with the game-winner in OT!  Impressive as ever.)
• Toronto looks good on the penalty kill late, but a lot of that is because Ottawa is trying to force what isn’t there; commentator mentioned that the Ottawa bench was visibly upset when Spezza turned the puck over on a marginal pass attempt.
• The Senators look REALLY good on the penalty kill late. I think they’re just that good.
• The NHL-centric advertising this year looks great so far, between the ‘Believe’ commercial and the (I grudgingly admit) pretty good Crosby RBK commercial. Now let’s see it somewhere that non-NHL fans might see it, huh? Most people who are watching the game on local TV don’t need to be convinced any more.

Now that Steckel has made the roster, it will be interesting to see how they use him.  In preseason, the Caps seemed to bring Gordon on pretty frequently for defensive-zone faceoffs, but Steckel is apparently equally talented on the draw; I’d be willing to bet that on that alone he gets to see a little time on the penalty kill than he would normally if he is, in fact, the fourth line center.

Green has been a fantastic offensive defenseman, and seems to really have some good hockey smarts; he’s able to take a forward position when he gets out of the penalty box without a problem, and that kind of jump is going to make him a great scoring threat both even strength and on the power play.  Look for him to get a bunch of goals over the course of the season just catching teams off-balance on line changes; I think he has the vision and the skills to surprise a lot of teams this season who may be expecting a less dangerous defenseman in the spot.

The other thing that’s been surprising about the last couple of days has been the volume of well wishes sent Ben Clymer’s way on the message boards and blogs since he cleared waivers and was assigned to Hershey.  He’s a grinder, and he played a big part in the Caps’ rebuilding; his demotion to the AHL is a good sign for the team, as it means the talent is finally deep enough on the NHL club that the bubble players are going to slip to where they’d be on a lot of other NHL teams, but he’ll be fantastic to hold onto for depth (assuming he’d ever clear waivers on the way back up), and there’s absolutely no ill will towards him by the fans for failing to make the team this season.

The Caps also bid a more final farewell to Jakub Klepis, who, in the absence of a contract from the team, simply failed to impress enough in camp to earn a spot on the team now that it’s more talent-heavy.  Since he was unsigned, look for him to move over to Europe, or perhaps to another NHL team that’s a little thirstier for depth players.  Best of luck to him, wherever he moves to.

The difference between making it and not making it at the highest professional level is so small; I wish the best of luck to the guys who are going to the AHL for more playing time, and I hope they can impress enough to merit the second look they all so desperately want, and to the players moving over to Europe, which can only be considered a failure if you think that being in the top 0.2% of players in the world instead of the top .1% means a whole lot in the great scheme of things.  Of course just as much to the guys who have earned their shot and now need to come out every night in the NHL and prove that they deserve to be there every shift of every game.

Goalies are easy: Kolzig is obviously the number one choice despite his play in camp (.850 save percentage).  Under a coach who’s also a former goalie like Glen Hanlon, Kolzig has a lot of leeway, and I’m sure both the fans and the players are hoping that he turns it on before the puck drops on the Capitals’ regular season; between coming in cold and not facing many shots (thanks to the Caps’ newfound defensive responsibility), what he’s faced in exhibition really shouldn’t be a representative sample of his play.  Although prospect Michael Neuvirth is coming along, Brent Johnson still easily took the backup spot with his solid play in training camp.  That accounts for two spots on the 23-man roster.

Defensemen are a tougher bet: it looked as if the top six would be Poti, Morrisson, Jurcina, Pothier, Schultz (who has been told to find a place to live in D.C.), and Green (who hasn’t been told anything yet), with the seventh spot up for grabs.  However, despite Green’s excellent training camp, in which he stated an incredibly strong case to be on the team, his waiver-exempt status would seem to put him as the #1 bubble player at the moment if no trade deal is made.  In any case, the team is probably going to take 7 of these to get up to 9 players out of 23.

As for forwards, things are a little more clear-cut.  The first line appears to be set at Ovechkin, Kozlov, and Fleischmann; the second appears to be Semin, Nylander, and Backstrom; the third is probably Pettinger, Gordon, and Clark, which leaves the fourth line, which from camp, would appear to make sense as Brashear, Steckel, and Laich.  The only forward currently on the roster who is waiver-exempt is Steckel, however, which makes him at-risk just like Green, despite a quality camp.  That still leaves a couple of spots for scratches each game, but there are no forwards other than Steckel that can now be removed from the roster except by a trade.

So what would be the optimum outcome?  The chatter on the blogs seems to have most fans and observers leaning towards a trade, though so far there’s not even a credible rumor as to who might go and for what return.

This has to be hard on the young, waiver-exempt players; they fought tooth and nail to earn a spot on the big club, and the motivations of the front office in keeping some veterans who, by their performance in camp, don’t deserve the spots as much off the waiver wire and on the NHL club certainly are mysterious.  I have yet to see a credible argument that Green belongs in the AHL this season, and even Steckel should have what it takes as a fourth-line center with his fantastic face-off skills; there’s a lot of skepticism among the fans about Schultz and why he merits a spot when those two don’t.

The other question has to be what the Caps can hope to get from a trade, besides roster space.  None of the players who would be on the block should a trade be in the works are deserving of giving up a first-round draft pick, even as a package.  I wouldn’t mind seeing the team move one skill player along with a couple of bubble guys for a solid right-winger or defenseman, but the question quickly becomes which teams are desperate enough for depth that they would make that deal, and with this kind of notice, it’s doubtful that anything like that would come through.  I think, especially at this stage in the building process, it would be disappointing to see the Caps get nothing out of their depth except for a second-round draft pick or a couple of third-rounders, even with the high quality of the upcoming draft class.

Do you think it’s the right time for the Caps to make a trade for little return?  Will Green and Steckel develop if they go down to Hershey, or is it the right time for them to make the jump?  Are the Caps looking at hurting themselves if they don’t play those two?  Let me know what you think in the comments.

The Rangers started off strong, with a flurry of nine shots very quickly. Particularly impressive so far have been Callahan, whose strength visibly improved during the offseason, and Gomez, who seems to have a good handle on the European style of entering the zone, zigging and zagging as he carries the puck in; he’ll be a good replacement for Nylander in that regard, and I expect that this is why he’s probably going to start the season as Jagr’s pivot. Dubinsky has also had some quality shots, and seems to be displaying pretty good aptitude for a turning shot that lets him get a quality chance even when he’s closely covered.

The big story of the first period has been Joey Macdonald, the Isles netminder; the Rangers came at him hard right out of the gate, and he made some solid, impressive saves to keep the clean sheet so far. If he’s going to go all the way, he could quickly build up favorable impressions among fans and coaches.

The game’s been moving quickly, and there’s no sign that the brawl that was the previous Isles-Rangers tilt has carried over yet; there are too many young kids on both sides trying too hard to prove something right now for rivalries to boil over at the moment. In the third period, however, when people start getting tired and taking lazy penalties, there still could be the potential for some heated arguments.

2nd Period:

Well, the floodgates opened for the Rangers here. The one line that has really been clicking is Gomez, pivoting Dawes and Shanahan. Dawes has really worked on his passing, and has been setting up Shanahan left and right, leading to two classic goals from the elder statesman of the Rangers’ forward corps. Gomez’ puck-carrying skills paid off for him as well, with his goal opening the floodgates.

Dubinsky is trying to introduce some edge to his game, laying a poorly-thought out late hit to Johnson of the Flyers, which led to a couple of rounds of fisticuffs; Dubinsky handled himself decently, freeing up his left enough to lay out a pretty good series of shots.

Macdonald’s hot streak couldn’t last, with two of the Rangers’ goals finding their way past him into the twine; still, he played an outstanding 20 minutes, and with some work on his consistency, could be a guy to watch in the future.

Also, I can’t say this enough about Blair Betts: the man knows how to use his body to get in the way of the puck. He blocks shots, he blocks passes, he deflects the puck out of the defensive zone, and he generally just gets in the play. I really love his dedication and the style of hockey he plays; he has to have a lot of hockey smarts to shut down the lanes the way he does.

Third Period:

Lots of scrapping here, but not much goal-scoring; the Isles bring it to within two goals, but Prucha buries an empty-netter at the end to put the Rangers up 5-2.

Isles-Rangers has every potential to be just as scrappy when the games count.  Things looked good for the whole group tonight, with that scoring line of Dawes-Gomez-Shanahan being an absolute standout, and getting all three stars of the game.  The Isles’ loss here doesn’t mean too much, as they were dressing a young team against the Rangers’ veterans, but both sets of coaches still have difficult decisions left to make in the coming days.

Boyd Gordon is really impressive this preseason; if he hasn’t made a case for his spot on the Capitals, nobody has. I’d hope at this point that he has that third-line center spot for Clark and Pettinger just about locked up, which is going to make for a fantastic shutdown line with Gordon’s defensive ability, Clark’s grit and ability to cause chaos, and Pettinger’s goal-scoring ability.

Eminger must have read the piece in the Post today about being a bubble player; he sends it towards the net, and Sutherby pokes a stick in there to redirect it and find the twine to tie it up. Jurcina and Fleischmann immediately follow it with a 2-on-1; I already think that Jurcina is one of the best defensemen on the team, and if he keeps jumping into offensive plays and making a difference, a lot more people are going to take notice this season.

Vogel makes an interesting point that Flash was benched for the last half of the third period last night, which is something I hadn’t noticed; I had known he was jumping ahead of the play and killing some good rushes by being a step offsides, and tonight he’s been ahead of the play and taken an unnecessary slashing call.

The Flyers owned the first in terms of puck possession and shots, but Sutherby’s tip-in keeps the Capitals tied up where it counts.

Also, apparently the Alexanders (one each of the Ovechkin and Semin varieties) made the drive together from D.C. to come watch their younger teammates play. That’s got to be good for team chemistry, knowing that your star teammates will come on their night off to watch an away game.

A shot by Eager from the point after a clean faceoff win beats Brent Johnson and puts the Flyers up 2-1.

Laich makes his way down the tunnel briefly after a big hit shakes him up midway through the second.

Biron holds up against a fantastic flurry. Eminger is just flurrying shots at the goalie here, he’s definitely angling for a big game tonight.

Gordon is still impressing, making a wraparound shot that ricochets off of Biron’s skate.

Despite a few good flurries by the Caps, the Flyers hold the 2-1 lead going into the third.

Erskine doesn’t get beaten in fights often, but tonight he gets taken down by Boulerice.

Nice move by the Flyers’ arena production staff, putting Bradley and Klepis on the ‘Kiss-Cam’. They may be on the bubble, but they play to the camera enough to get a laugh out of the road crowd.

Lots of back-and-forth play in this third period, with nobody really dominating.

Bigger cheer from the crowd for the Nationals rallying from a 6-run deficit to take the lead over the Mets, which keeps the Phillies (who are also winning) in the race for the NL East.

Philly hangs on late on the penalty kill, stopping a 6-on-4 power play and running out the clock to cling to the 2-1 win over the Capitals.

Final Score (OT) - Capitals 3, Hurricanes 2

Thoughts from overtime:

4-on-3 time - big penalty kill for the Caps if they can do it. Shootouts shouldn’t be such a curse this year, with our two big free agent forwards both having a good track record in the shootout.

Poti intercepts a pass and goes. Gets taken down hard and draws a penalty, and he’s shaken but not hurt. 3-on-3 time.   Caps can’t convert the power play.

Green to Backstrom and they SCORE!  A revenge preseason OT win for the Capitals over the Hurricanes, and Green is showing that he deserves a spot on the Caps’ roster tonight.

Thoughts from the third period:

Well, I may have jinxed the Caps there. Kolzig gives up the early rebound and goal. Caps 2, Canes 1. Not much that Kolzig could do after giving up that rebound.

First 3rd-period Caps penalty… Eminger starts the march. Let’s see if they can stop it before it gets out of hand again tonight.

Not a lot of whistles, but a lot of scoring chances for the ‘Canes, as Walker fails to finish after beating Kolzig thoroughly.

Hearing that Dean McAmmond of the Senators got hurt badly and is out on a stretcher in the Senators-Flyers tilt. It was Downie of the Flyers who laid out the elbow to his head, which is a shame; he was a kid with a tough start trying to get things back on track, but he had behavior problems in his lower leagues too, and if the new NHL is serious about punishing unprovoked shots to the head, this should effectively derail his rise to the NHL for now. Off Wing Opinion had an excellent article recently on concussions in the NHL that now seems spookily prescient.

‘Canes score again to make it 2-2. The Caps just can’t hold the 2-goal leads for now, which is worrying; the Rangers had a tough time with those last season, and would have gone into the postseason in better position had they won a few more that they took 2-goal leads into the 3rd in.

The Caps are getting a ton of chances this period, but so far no luck getting anything past the ‘Canes netminder. Poti especially is getting a lot of shots from the point, which is encouraging for a club that needs the D-men to step up offensively if they want to be a playoff contender this year.

Gordon is really, really good on faceoffs right now, I like that they’re sending him in for all the important face-offs. Alexander Semin takes a poor penalty to stop a meaningless end-of-period breakaway, instead leaving the Caps to kill the penalty in overtime.

Thoughts from the second period:

The Caps’ power play unit gets another chance right at the top of the tilt, but still isn’t impressing; miscues keep sending it back into neutral or defensive territory. Kozlov seems to be the weak link in some of the passing when he’s on the ice for the man advantage.

Green to the box again, this time for tripping; I’d rather see the Caps be taking penalties on edgy penalties and not delay of game or tripping. On the plus side, he’s given the team their chances tonight to show that the penalty kill is looking good.

Kolzig is still solid tonight. Not facing many shots, but he’s stopping the ones he’s seeing so far.

The offense is still out of sync. Flash has stopped a couple of rushes by being a step offside, and I’m hoping that’s just an issue of him getting used to Ovechkin’s speed and not a worrying lack of timing.

The Caps’ Russian duo (2007-’08 edition) does it! Power-play finally clicks, with good puck movement getting Ovechkin a shot, Kozlov a redirect, and the Capitals a 2-0 lead late in the 2nd (on only their second or third scoring chance of the period, no less).

The Caps hold up, even though they allow 10 shots on goal this period; they carry the 2-goal lead into the second intermission. Let’s see if they can finally hold onto a 2-goal lead this preseason.

Thoughts from the first period:

Klepis had a wide-open net, but failed to finish on an early chance. That’s not going to help his case right now; when you get a chance that good, you have to put it in the back of the net.

Green may have made a mental error taking an early delay-of-game penalty, but he makes up for it right out of the penalty box by taking the wing position and starting a give-and-go play with Fleischmann that Green eventually backhands into the twine to give the Caps a 1-0 lead. Maybe Flash is trying to prove my skepticism of his first-line potential wrong.

How low is the glass at the Verizon Center? There have been three penalties so far, two for delay of game.

“Nylander… to Semin, back to Nylander… feeds it to Semin… Semin, behind the net, to Nylander…” I have a feeling we’re going to hear that call a lot on the power-play this year.

For a team that sent the scorers out tonight and not the heavy hitters, the Caps seem to be doing a decent job along the boards tonight.

The Caps’ power play units still need some time to mesh. They didn’t sound tremendously effective in the first, and failed to convert on the man advantage three times; they’re moving the puck well, but just not putting together the quality chances that they’ll want to see.

The Capitals lead one to nil after the first, holding the Hurricanes to seven chances; along with the Bolts game this weekend, this has to be a validation of the puck-possession style they’re moving towards.

Most people assumed when talented puck-moving pivot Michael Nylander was signed by the Capitals, it was for the express purpose of setting up Alexander Ovechkin; while nobody (except maybe coach Glen Hanlon, if he knows more than he’s telling) knows the final lines that will be taking the ice, Alexander Ovechkin seems pretty confident that it’s going to be Viktor Kozlov centering his line this year.  This struck me at least as a strange move; the team brought in a premier Swedish center at a premium price, and one of their talented rookies this year is a Swedish center who’s well on his way to converting his potential upside to actual performance, so the assumption was that the team would put Alexander Ovechkin and Nylander on the first line, and Alexander Semin and Backstrom on the second, so that Nylander could lead by example and feed Ovechkin chances.  Instead, Nylander has played almost from the beginning of camp as Semin’s pivot, with Backstrom moved out of position to play as the second-line right wing.  In addition, Kozlov is out of position (he has played center, but it’s not his natural position), leaving a big question mark on the right wing, currently being filled by Tomas Fleischmann, or “Flash“.

Now, while these are all talented players, it means that what Hanlon considers his optimal lines don’t have what the fans would expect, based on previous player performance.  I’m sure there are a lot more factors going into this than anyone outside of the Capitals locker room understands, but at a glance, the two options seem to be that somebody in camp is performing well under or over expectations, or that certain players have had so many intangibles when together on the ice that it’s worth sacrificing an optimal configuration to get them on the same line.

What originally was worrying when Nylander got his bump to the second line was that perhaps he was performing well below par; however, having watched him in New York frequently, I didn’t see him as the kind of player who could possibly have that sort of drop-off in his game in one off-season.  I also trust that Tarik or the OFB Team would tell everyone if they were seeing the flameout of the decade from him in camp, and so far they’ve only had good things to say.  However, I also haven’t heard anything so outrageously good about Kozlov that would indicate he’s done enough to elevate his game both overall and at the center position to make skill alone account for the move.

Having Kozlov play first-line center is what’s really interesting.  I know NHL superstar-turned-blogger Alex Ovechkin wanted to play with Kozlov (he was a big part of having him brought here, if memory and rumor serves me correctly), and he already had great chemistry with him (this Q&A from Mike Vogel’s blog has Ovechkin saying that playing with Kozlov is as good as with Zubrus from a chemistry standpoint).  However, the “natural” configuration would have been Kozlov at right wing and Backstrom at center; the addition of Poti and the shot-stifling play against the Bolts this preseason indicate that the Capitals coaching staff want the team to move to a more puck-possession centered game, and placing a sub-par faceoff man like Kozlov at first-line center seems to go against that philosophy.  If the Caps want to get Ovechkin the puck so he and Kozlov can work together, it’s going to be a lot more difficult when they have to go retrieve it from the other team well over half the time.

The biggest issue that this would seem to create for the Capitals, besides Kozlov in the face-off circle, is the first-line right wing spot.  With promising 2003 first-round pick Eric Fehr injured, Flash seems to be the go-to guy; while I agree that he’s got every chance to be a top-6 forward, I’m concerned about his ability to finish plays.  Again, with the assumption that the Capitals are moving towards a puck possession strategy, they’re going to be looking to hold and move the puck in the offensive zone and wait to punish the defense for their mistakes.  Although there are already two snipers out there on the first line who can punish mistakes, Flash’s game seems like a marginal fit to work with them within that gameplan.

However, those of us looking in from the outside move forward with the (justified) assumption that Hanlon knows what the hell he’s doing.  So, the burning question for me going into this season is going to be:  Just how good are Semin, Nylander, and Backstrom when they’re on the ice together?  If the Capitals are moving forward with these lines based in large part on the play of that second line, they must believe that disrupting Ovechkin’s gameplan and making it harder to get the puck to him, as well as reducing the scoring threat from the other wing while he’s on the ice (letting teams ratchet the pressure up on him) is a necessary evil that comes with getting this second line, and that indicates that they believe that the second-line is going to be huge this season, perhaps even a bigger threat than any combination of Ovechkin, a Swedish center, and Kozlov.

What do you think?  Do you think Hanlon is looking to experiment early in the year, or does he have this set in his mind as the configuration of the 2007-’08 Washington Capitals?  Is putting together Semin, Nyls, and Backstrom going to be as good as putting together chocolate and peanut butter (along with an Islanders-orange wrapper named Poti at the point)?  Will adding Kozlov on that first line keep Ovechkin from getting frustrated that he’s going to carry the first line on his shoulders for another year, or will the two Russians together be able to convince the league (and the fans) that Flash can be a premier threat worthy of the position?  Most importantly, do you think that this lineup gives the Capitals the best chance to win?

First of all, some clarification for those unfamiliar with this year’s hockey video games: There are essentially three different video game hockey offerings this year. Take Two has released their NHL 2K8 for next-gen platforms, and EA has put out one version of NHL ‘08 for next-gen platforms (360 and PS3) and another for the current-gen platforms (PS2 and PC). NHL 2K8 has gotten some flak for a less-intuitive control scheme, and the PS2 and PC versions of ‘08 have been fairly universally panned. I won’t be covering either of those products in any more detail. If you have a 360 or PS3, the EA offering is the one with a guy with a red Carolina Hurricanes jersey.

Some of us poor saps known as sports fans will buy a sports video game every year, only to find out that we haven’t gotten much more for our bucks than an incremental upgrade and a roster update. Last year, EA definitely took home the ‘most-improved’ crown for introducing a completely new control scheme that allows the player to control the player’s stick actions (deking and shooting) entirely with the right thumbstick, with passing being handled by only one button beyond that. It revolutionized the genre; unfortunately, a total lack of AI left the player last year feeling like one able guy playing hockey against zombies, and after the novelty of the control scheme wore off, the game got old fast against the AI.

EA took the criticisms last year to heart, and seem to have set their priorities on this year’s edition just right. The first thing that you’ll notice is the AI; in comparison to last year’s total failure, this time EA has put together a hell of an offensive and defensive AI. On offense, the CPU player will cycle the puck, set up properly in the zone, feed to the point, and generally play like you’d expect the team’s real-life counterpart to play. Defenses will set up to shut your scoring opportunities down instead of just skating around ineffectually chasing the puck-carrier last year. These AI improvements alone would have given this year’s edition some great staying power.

Fortunately for us sports fans, however, they decided not to stop there. The skating engine from last year was also scrapped and rewritten from scratch; players now feel like they have some weight and inertia to them, and they have more difficulty hanging onto the puck when making a series of tight maneuvers; this is especially noticeable across players with different skill levels… try to dangle in the zone with Alexander Ovechkin and you’ll get a lot farther than with, say, Donald Brashear. The skating engine is actually so good that it makes the skating practice mini-game tolerable and worthwhile.

The other big addition from a casual gamer/hardcore hockey fan perspective is the addition of other leagues; in addition to the NHL, the game now covers the entire AHL (essentially the highest minor league for American hockey), as well as two European leagues and international teams. It’s a lot of fun to finally take the Hershey Bears out for a few games. These improvements are more than just cosmetic; during a career mode the game tracks the AHL fully, allowing the GM-minded to try players from their real minor-league systems.

The improved AI and skating engine has a ripple effect that just makes the rest of the game better, too. Teams now play much more like their real-life counterparts, with less skilled teams having to play more conservative games to keep from getting caught out of position (which is far more dangerous this year than in years past). Run-and-gun hockey still works with a highly-skilled, fast team like the Rangers, but they can also fall back on a ‘pass-first’ European style of hockey and be as effective, while teams like the Capitals with less skill and speed can still be effective setting up in the zone and feeding to the slot or up to the point; this, along with the game adapting to the strategies you use, really does make every game so far different, instead of a contest to set up the best one-timers as in years past.

Of course, it wouldn’t be EA if they didn’t improve the graphics, and the virtual players now bear a striking resemblance to their real-life counterparts; sticklers for detail will be happy to hear that I could even recognize a couple of faces from the Hershey Bears who were back-and-forth to the Capitals last season. The game, at least on the 360, runs at an absolutely smooth frame-rate, and technically appears to be sound.

Online play is fantastic this time around too; ranked matches let you track your stats in games against opponents of similar skill level, and the matchmaking did a great job of keeping me with opponents against whom I was very evenly-matched. There’s little to no lag, even playing a game with one end in NYC and the other in Vancouver. There also don’t seem to be that dreaded killer of online hockey, the ‘money plays’ that score on a goalie every time; the variety of goals is great, but in general the only reliable way to score is to set up a play that would have a good shot at scoring in real life, and goalies seem pretty good about stopping hard shots from all angles.

Overall, I’m quite happy with the improvements made to this year’s NHL offering, and for the first time in several years, I can’t think of a glaring oversight that I’m already waiting for next year’s game to fix.

The Caps spent the entire third clinging tenaciously to a 2-1 lead over the Lightning.  From a Capitals perspective, there seem to be two big stories to this one: the penalties, and the shots on goal.

Through two periods, the Caps held the Lightning to 9 shots on goal, which, when you compare it to last season, has to feel good.  The Caps defense seems to be starting to solidify after last season’s shaky start; though I have yet to see a game, I’m hoping this means that our young defensive corps, now with another year of experience under their belts, are starting to step up and solidify their games.

However, the other big story of the night threatened to undo all the good our defense did; the Caps, once again, got extraordinarily penalty-happy in the 3rd.  I’m hoping that they can cut this out, since this is the 3rd consecutive preseason game with 3 or more penalties in the final tilt; this time it was 5, all while they were struggling to hold that 2-1 lead.  Especially with one and two goal leads, the Caps can’t afford to let this become habit; giving up goals because you took the unnecessary penalty is a morale killer for sure, and the Caps are still too young a team to hold together if they start losing games because of mental errors like this.

It’s a lot harder to draw conclusions from a close matchup like this in the preseason than it is to take something away from the Rangers-Flyers contest; here we simply had a lot of young, hungry guys battling, with the ones from out of town taking this one.  It’s a nice momentum-booster, it certainly is always positive to get a preseason road win against a Southeast opponent, but I’m not sure it has much long-term meaning past that.

As ever, I’d appreciate any perspective from anyone who caught more of the game than me, or thinks they caught something interesting that I missed.