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© St. Petersburg Times, published April 17, 2003
What do they say? History repeats itself?
The Capitals tried to keep a stiff upper lip after Wednesday's Game 4 loss, but now they're starting to look like Scooby and Shaggy after seeing a g-g-ghost.
Washington, you see, has a history of squandering leads in the playoffs. Three times, the Capitals have been up 2-0 in a series. Twice, they have lost. Now that they have dropped two games at home in less than 24 hours, they are halfway to Chokesville again.
After winning the first two games of the series -- in Tampa, no less -- the Capitals know full well they could be propping up their feet right now with a cold one in one hand and the remote in the other while waiting for their next opponent.
Instead, they are coming to Tampa Bay even in the series and trying to erase the whispers of, "Here we go again."
"Obviously, this one is really disappointing," Washington goalie Olaf Kolzig said. "It's now the best of three, and we can't be the team that plays like a deer caught in the headlights."
Unlike the first two games, when Tampa Bay made the bumbling, inexperienced mistakes, the Capitals have lost their cool in the past two games. And all along, Lightning coach John Tortorella, over and over again, keeps talking about the Capitals' inability to close out postseason series.
Washington coach Bruce Cassidy, though, is choosing to look at the math, not the history.
"It's two-all now, and we can't beat ourselves up over that," Cassidy said. "We got two on them down there, and they got two games on us. The secret to success in this series is who gets the first goal."
Didn't it seem like just the other day when there was talk of organizing a search party to find the Lightning's Martin St. Louis?
Only six of his 33 goals came after the All-Star break, and if it weren't for getting whacked in the face (and receiving 24 stitches) with a high stick in Game 1, few except those with the last name of "St. Louis" would have noticed he played the first two games.
In Washington, though, St. Louis was found. All anyone had to do was look for the red light behind the Capitals goal. Playing with Vinny Lecavalier and Vinny Prospal for the second straight night, St. Louis scored two goals Wednesday and has three goals and two assists in the past two games.
"He obviously has a lot of talent," Lightning captain Dave Andreychuk said. "But he never quits. He is tenacious with the puck."
St. Louis scored the critical first goal Wednesday, and it was a beauty. He made a dipsy-doodle move in, around and through Brendan Witt then blistered a shot between Kolzig's pads.
"I wasn't trying to pick a spot," St. Louis said. "I just want to get it on net."
Just how good have Lecavalier, St. Louis and Prospal been in the past two games? Since being shuffled onto the same line, the three have put up incredible numbers.
In Games 3 and 4, the three have combined for seven goals, three assists, 17 shots and a combined plus-16 rating.
"We're going well right now," Lecavalier said. "Marty has really been making things happen."
Maybe the Lightning should petition the league about playing the rest of the series in Washington. So far, the first four games have been won by the visiting team, leading Tortorella to wonder if winning the division, and securing home-ice advantage for the first round of the postseason, was worth it.
Home ice, it seems, has been a curse throughout the league. Through Tuesday, home teams had won only 12 of 26 games. Knowing that, Tortorella questioned if the Lightning wouldhave been better off losing the division to Washington.
"You spend all the time trying to get home ice," Tortorella said. "It's a tough thing, especially in this series."
Hindsight being what it is, Tortorella said he would have preferred opening this series on the road.
"(We wanted to) end up testing the waters a little bit about playoff hockey without your home crowd," Tortorella said. "But you have a division on the line, so you have to try to win it."
For all of the talk that the Lightning might not sell out its home games, the Capitals haven't even come close to selling out the MCI Center. Thursday night's crowd was the smallest of the series: 15,576. That meant nearly 3,000 empty seats.
Tortorella and Cassidy are making their playoff debuts as head coaches. It's the first time since 1997 two coaches made their playoff debuts in the same series. In 1997, Don Hay (Phoenix) faced Ron Wilson (Anaheim) and Ken Hitchcock (Dallas) faced Ron Low (Edmonton). There is another series with two coaches making their debuts against each other: Detroit's Dave Lewis is facing Anaheim's Mike Babcock.