It seems to me that people who attend a season's very first home exhibition game, on a Monday night, necessarily rank among those who most missed hockey over the summer. I was struck not only by the overall volume attending Monday night's 2-1 Caps' loss to Buffalo -- the crowd was demonstrably larger than those of a good many regular season games in 2005-06 -- but how many on a warm muggy night wore their red sweaters. Yes the Caps are the hot sports ticket in town ...