One Alex was out, one Alex returned.

The Ovechkin-less Washington Capitals behind a 4 point night from returning Alexander Semin pounded the Florida Panthers 6-2 last night.  It was Semin’s first game in 7 games due to a wrist injury.  Semin tallied 2 goals and 2 assists to lead the Capitals offensive onslaught.

Panthers Capitals Hockey

The Caps dominated the night from start to finish, minus the last two minutes where the Capitals defense decided to get lazy, exposing Semyon Varlamov to a flurry of Panther shots that broke the shutout bid for the young net minder.

The Capitals chased Florida goalie Scott Clemmensen early in the first period, scoring twice on Clemmensen within 76 seconds of one another.  Young back up Alexander Salak didn’t fare much better, getting hammered for 4 goals on the night.  The Caps offense put up 44 shot son gao and the Panther penalized themselves to death, with 12 penalties and43 total penalty minutes.

The first Caps goal came half way through the first period on a nasty slapper from Semin.  It was assisted by Brooks Laich.  It was Semin’s 10th of the season.  The 2nd goal of the first period was scored by Tomas Fleischmann, who took a juicy rebound left by Clemmensen and ended a personal goal scoring drought of 7 games and that tally chased Clemmensen to the bench.  Caps out shot the Panthers in the first period by a whopping 18-6 in a period completely dominated by the Caps. [Read more →]

Read more at

http://dcprosportsreport.com/2009/12/04/caps-semin-hammer-panthers.html