You know, I wanna think we can do it... I mean if we win both at home it's wide open again. I just haven't seen any consistency in the team all season that would lead to a surge of confidence. The playoffs have been a microcosm of what we've seen all year. Showing flashes of brilliant play caught up in a sandwich of mediocrity and slumping. I'm not expecting much at this point, but it's not so much pissy negativity as it is acceptance. I'm OK with it. Bring on next season =)
Yeah, I've honestly been kind of in acceptance mode since sometime in February or so. I really feel like next year is this team's year, but the pieces are that that if they could just click into another gear, get a little luck, and get some fortuitous matchups, they could still go far.
Next year, mostly the same lineup, no real major offseason moves, with a full Torts training camp and guys like Kreider, Miller, McIlrath, Fasth, Thomas, etc. with another year of experience under their belts, not to mention all the critical guys in contract years who are going to be playing their asses off...it's a promising looking mix of circumstances. I like next year's chances.
This year is pretty much a crapshoot, has been almost from the beginning. Having said that, we're still totally capable of beating this Caps team. We beat ourselves yesterday, and the truth is that even just a tiny itsy bitsy little bit of offense would turn the series completely on its ear, and this team IS capable of that. Just not reliably.
Also, holy shit at that salt from Therrien. Those are Dead Sea salinity levels right there.