Hershey Bears Win Championship! ..and That Other Team Wins One Too

Get the full photo gallery and more at Washington-Capitals-Examiner~y2009m6d13-Hershey-Bears-win-championship-and-that-other-team-wins-one-too">Washington Capitals Examiner

Those guys from Pennsylvania did it. …The Hershey Bears won the Calder Cup! (more on that other team later)

The nice thing about the game is that Hershey dominated from the get-go. They had a 3 goal lead on the Manitoba Moose less than twelve minutes into the game off goals from Andrew Gordon, Chris Bourque and a playoff leading 15^th goal for Alexandre Giroux who also set a Bears playoff post-season record with the goal.

From there it looks like Michael Neuvirth did the rest, as he ha throughout the entire post-season.

Neuvirth made 24 saves on 25 shots and with four shutouts throughout the playoffs and sixteen wins;the 21-year-old was named post-season MVP.  

I was not that impressed with Neuvirth’s play while he was in DC as I thought he was a little slow to react on certain plays and needed to improve his glove. Still, it sounds like the future for this guy is beyond bright, and if he can play well we may soon not need the services of Jose Theodore and his expensive contact. 

Anyways congrats to Hershey, on their championship and for winning it’s 10^th championship, the most in minor league hockey. Every Caps fan should be accepted about this development, winning needs to be ingrained in every portion of an organization, not just at the top.

As for that other team…

Well I’m not going to lie, I’m pretty mad that the Penguins won the Stanley Cup. Most of that goes back to the teams cocky fan base. I just remember going to a Caps-Penguins game from two years ago and these three popped-collar frat boy made it a point to specifically stand-up at certain moments of plays because they knew it would anger the Caps fan behind them. These guys were loud, they were vindictive and they showed no respect whatsoever. Half of the section wanted to fight these guys at the end of the game, and this was in the lower section, you know the supposedly rich “wine and cheese crowd” who can afford to sit closer to the ice. Still at the end of the night at least 4 or 5 fans were calling out these jerks to fight. Heck even I, your mild-mannered reporter wanted to do it, and anybody who knows me, knows I can’t fight.   

Anyways rant over. I’ve seen some very passionate knowledgeable Penguins fans in my time, but I’ve also seen too many people like those young punks who think they still own the place when they come to D.C., like this is 1995 again, when Penguins fans came down by the busloads and at times would take over the old USAir Arena in Landover.

Other than that, I don’t really have a problem with Hurricanes-the-Caps-in-reverse-Is-Sidney-Crosby-a-jerk-That-and-more" target="_blank">Sidney Crosby and the Pens. As I said in a previous article, I really don’t see anything wrong with Crosby. He is what he is, a super-talented playmaker that just doesn’t let loose with the media. Nothing wrong with that, not everybody needs to have the magnetism of Ovechkin, and yes while he can be pouty and did complain about hats being thrown on the ice during Ovechkin’s hat-trick. (A super weak complaint) But as Mario Lemieux said last night, “This kid, all he thinks about is winning championships. His whole life is training and practicing and playing hockey. He's a great kid, a perfect hockey player, that's all he does, think about hockey every day. It's amazing. I wish I would have had that discipline back then." I guess I have to begrudgingly respect that. Crosby is anti-drama he like so much of the league is the anti T.O. It’s all about putting on a show on the ice and leaving all the other theatrics aside. Still, will I still boo the hell out of him when he plays us? Of course!

Outside of that, I really wish the Caps had 2^nd line players like Max Talbot, Bill Guerinand Ruslan Fedetenko. Talbot and Guerin especially, are guys who play every aspect of the game and show up for all of their around 18 minutes of ice-time, an effort our second line players such as Victor Kozlov, Sergei Federov and Brooks Laichsimply couldn’t match. Often you’re only as good as your supporting cast, and the Caps especially now with the possible loss of Federov and Kozlov need to work on getting a better one.

Non-game notes: Man I’m going to miss drinking Molson but it just doesn’t work in the summer or for the non-hockey season. I mean you wouldn’t drink a wine spritzer after topping off twelve Buffalo wings? (or maybe you would, who the hell am I to tell you what to do!) It just doesn’t fit. So I guess I’m going to have wait another 4 months. I’ll tell you what though; the NHL 2010 countdown begins now!

Oh and I may have a major interview with a member of the Caps organization. I'll let you all know about that when I do.