Your savory breakfast links:
- The Caps had to wait for the Jackets and Isle to battle it out, but Cam Atkinson‘s shootout goal on old friend Jaroslav Halak guaranteed that home-ice belongs to Washington in this first round. [WaPo, CSNW, RMNB]
- The League and teams have released the first-round schedules and the puck will drop for Game One of the 2015 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs at 7pm on Wednesday, April 15 in the Verizon Center. [Rink, Caps Today (TV, radio schedules), Dump ‘n’ Chase, NHL.com]
- Barry Trotz bring sixty games of playoff experience and a steady hand on the tiller as his new squad preps for the postseason. [DC Sports Bog]
- It is NOT POSSIBLE that 1993 was 22 years ago, but anyway, that was when the Caps and Isles last met in Patrick postseason play. [NHL.com]
- So. How do the teams stack up? [CSNW (video)]
- Recaps and other assorted musings on yesterday’s regular-season finale from us, Vogs (plus game notes), Monumental video (Trotz, Brouwer, Galiev, Niskanen, Holtby, Alzner), NHL.com, AP, WaPo, DSP, RMNB, and from the Blueshirts’ end of the ice, BSB, Rangers Report.
- Congrats to Stanislav Galiev on the occasion of his first NHL goal (on his second NHL shot, and on a damn fine, er, world class goaltender.) [Monumental (video), RMNB, Station Nation, Caps Outsider, Caps OT, @SJSeadogs]
- Congrats also to Caps captain Alex Ovechkin, who scored his single-season record 25th goal on the power play, which marked his 53rd of the campaign and 475th for his career and he’ll have to keep a few days free in July to head to Vegas to receive his third-consecutive and fifth-overall Maurice “Rocket” Richard Trophy…
- …and he scored that goal with an assist from Nicklas Backstrom; it was NB19’s league-leading 60th helper on the season and 427th for his career. The Flyers‘ Jakub Voracek finished one tick behind Backstrom with 59 apples. [viasatsport.se via GoogleTrans]
- The pre-game featured some nifty presentations to the Caps’ record-shattering superduo. [Monumental (video)]
- Mid-game featured the final salute in the 40th Anniversary series of the Caps’ 40 greatest players – always and forever Alexander the Gr8. [Monumental (video)]
- And the post-game featured the annual Jerseys Off Our Backs presentation. [Monumental (video), RMNB (photos), Caps Outsider (photos, and again), and for some reason Karl Alzner‘s lack of pants is a Really Big Deal (DC Sports Bog)]
- The Hershey Bears dropped their second game of two against the St. John’s IceCaps 5-1, which made room for the Manchester Monarchs to capture the Eastern Conference crown and home-ice advantage for the playoffs. Of note: This was goaltender Pheonix Copley ‘s first regulation loss since November 23. [Patriot-News]
- The South Carolina Stingrays have also qualified for post season play, and If The Playoffs Started Today™, they would face the team the Caps were affiliated with through last season, the Reading Royals. [ECHL]
- Extra congrats to Caps prospect forward Brian Pinho, whose Providence College Friars won the NCAA D-1 Men’s Ice Hockey National Championship over Boston University 4-3. He won the USHL title last year, so that’s two national championships in a row. [@SportsCenter, Before & After]
- Finally, happy 62nd birthday to Mike Bloom, happy 66th to Bob Girard, happy 61st to Antero Lehtonen, and happy 41st to Roman Hamrlik.
- One more: The Japers’ Rink staff would like to extend our thanks and appreciation to all the folks we regularly (and irregularly!) link here. It has been our great privilege to experience the 2014-2015 season through your words, photos and videos, and we look forward to sharing the second season and beyond.