Pre-Cap: Capitals vs. Rangers

Washington Capitals vs. New York Rangers
Game Seven
Verizon Center

What can we say about this game that hasn't been said a million times over the course of six games?

The Caps know what happened last year. It's probably posted on their bulletin board, and it's been staring them in the face all year long when they look into the rafters of Verizon Center. Southeast Division Champions, 2007-2008, a great season that ended on a low note.

Not this year, not today, we hope.

As bloodthirsty as it sounds, the Capitals need to embrace their killer instinct, they need to feed off the crowd's desire to send the Rangers up I-95 on what we could call the new "Trail of Tears." The Caps need to come out and drive a stake through the Rangers' playoff hopes and keep driving it until they are left twitching and begging to be lining up for the postgame handshakes.

Game Seven has to be more than a win. It has to be a statement game, a game that announces that Caps hockey is back and that 3-1 lead  the Rangers once held was nothing more than an unfortunate fluke.

The Caps have had every unit working in the past two games: offense, defense, goaltending and special teams. For two games in a row, the Capitals have put together all the key elements and in those games, dominated from the first whistle to the final buzzer. They were total team efforts, efforts that were not won by the heroics of one player, but many.

Teams leading 3-1 in the Quarterfinals win .955% of the time. Earlier last week, we asked if the Capitals could be the .45%.

Tonight we get our answer.