Caps win 4-1.

1st preseason game of the year, and the Caps beat Carolina 4-1. Fleischman with 2 goals, Bradley with 1 goal, Kozlov with 3 assist.

Training camp starts today.

I'll be posting updates all day long. The only news I have right now is that Backstrom skated this morning and went through some drills. He was wearing a different colored jersey then everybody else. Yesterday Boudreau said that Backstrom wasn't going to skate, but I guess his ankle was feeling good. Backstrom only skated for about 30 minutes before he left the ice. I don't know if Caps management was just limiting his ice time, or if he re-aggravated it.

Caps win 7-0.

The Caps rookie's beat the Flyer's rookie's 7-0 today. I haven't been able to watch the game yet, but I'll watch it later and post stats and what I thought.

9/18/08---Flyers@Caps--2:00 p.m.

Here's the line-up for tonite's rookie game against the Flyers. The game starts at 2:00 p.m. and the game will be at Kettler iceplex in Arlington, Virgina. The game is free to attend, but you need to have gotten tickets from the Caps webiste. The game sold-out 2 days after they went on sale. You can download the game later tonite from washingtoncaps.com.

Forwards
Bouchard-Perreault-Pinizzotto
Osala-Beagle-Kugryshev
Lacroix-Morin-Leffler
Taylor-Broda-Della Rovere


Defense
Alzner-Godfrey
Mestery-Carlson
Dovgan-Collins

Goalies
Varlamov
Neuvirth
Holtby

My predictions for the game? 3-2 Caps rookies, I think Della Rovere, Osala, and Godfrey will score goals today. I'll have an update after the game is over.

Camp rosters announced

Here's the rosters from the Caps website. It'll be good to have Gustafsson and Kugryshev both at rookie camp. I think that's a pretty good team that can compete with the Flyers rookie team.

And we have our first injury......Backstrom sprains ankle

Tarik's got the story here.

That's the 1 bad thing that can go wrong in these pre-training camp practices. Players could get hurt when it doesn't really matter. Hopefully Nicky B, can recover fast. Let's hope his ankle sprain isn't as bad as Semin's was to start last year.

Alex Ovechkin has arrived

Alex Ovechkin is at Kettler this morning practicing in the informal practices. This is great news. I'll post more when I know more.

Update: This is from Tarik's blog.

After watching Ovechkin for about 45 minutes, it was obvious that he worked hard on his conditioning over the summer. After talking to him, I got the impression that he worked on his English a bit too.

"We know we have a good team, but we have to play better than last year to be better. We have to keep going like the last month of last year. It's going to be a good year."

Another update from informal pratices.

Michael Neuvirth, Eric Fehr, Jakub Cutta, Tomas Fleischman, and Jay Beagle all arrived at Kettler today and they are practicing. Also we have some number changes, Eric Fehr will be wearing #16 this year, he wore #16 when he played in the WHL, and Tomas Fleischman will be taking Fehr's old number 14. So make sure you don't get them confused.

Also Jeff Schultz said that he did a lot of weight training this summer and he says that he has bulked up to 228 lbs. That's 10 more pounds then last year. Remember Schultz is 6'6 so he still has some more room to get stronger.

Numbers at informal practices increase.

Brent Johnson, Jose Theodore, Karl Alzner, Brooks Laich, Boyd Gordon, Nicklas Backstrom, Donald Brashear, Shaone Morrisonn, David Steckel, John Erskine, Chris Clark, Matt Bradley, and Michael Nylander were all skating at Kettler yesterday. That's about half the team, they seem excited to get the season started.

Tarik has an update on Nylander.

Also Backstrom has apparently gotten a hair cut.

Las Vegas odds on winning the Stanley Cup

The odds can be found here. The Caps have, according to Las Vegas, an 18/1 chance to winning the Stanley Cup. That's the 10th highest in the NHL. If I was a betting man I'd put my money on the Caps! To bad I can't go to Las Vegas and put some money on the Caps.

Update on Pothier, and small Morrisonn interview.

Tarik has both of the stories, they can be found here, and here. Pothier talks about how he's feeling, and Morrisonn talks about the arbitration hearing that happened earlier this offseason.

Here's some of what Pothier had to say.

"I plateaued a bit over the summer. But now I can get my heart rate up and sustain that. I've done some weights, a bit of running - not a lot - just to see where I'm at. It's been progressing."

"It's such a vague thing - I can't even put a time on it. Right now I'm kind of out of shape. It's going to take some time to get in shape. Even if I was clear and free today, it would take me some time to get into shape."

Here's what Morrison had to say.

"It's our right as players, and if I had to do it again, I would," he said. "There's no hard feelings. They have the same rights. It's part of the business.This game is a business as well. I'm just glad to be back and that everything is settled."

#11 to join 5, 7, 32 in the rafters.

The Washington Capitals announced that they will retire Mike Gartner's #11 jersey number. The number will no longer be worn by a Washington Capital ever again. The ceremony will be held on December 28th against the Toronto Maple Leafs, who Gartner played part of his career with. Gartner will be remembered as a speedy, fast player who scored over 300 goals, and 700 points with the Washington Capitals.

Congratulations Mike!