Not Our Time.... Yet.

Not much I can say right now. That pretty much sucked. The Caps were outplayed somewhat during the series, but fought real hard and were able to get to Game 7. They were outplayed pretty badly in Game 7 and that's why the season is over. The one thing I hope the team takes out of this playoff run is that they have to play as a team. They need to trust each other more and winning the little battles along the boards and forechecking is the key to playoff success. The Caps did very little of that against a slightly more experienced Penguins team early in the series and especially in Game 7. There are no excuses, but here is the skinny on some major injuries courtesy of the Post: Mike Green had a bum shoulder, the same one he hurt in Anaheim. Tom Poti had a broken foot, which he suffered in Game 1 of this series. Ovechkin was battling a groin injury. Alexander Semin was also hurt, though I'm not certain of his injury. I did hear, however, that the injury likely would have sidelined him in the regular season. I have to say that the courage of Poti to play with a broken foot for 6 games is unreal. We all knew that Green was not 100% and he played tentative for most of the playoff run. Ovechkin didn't have as much of his explosiveness, but come on, what more could he have done and Semin may have been hurt, but he has to learn some things about how to play as a team before next year's postseason. On the bright side, this playoff run, while disappointing, was a step forward. I hope the team gained valuable experience and I hope this helps them to take the next step next year. There will be a lot of talk about what to do with certain players. Should Fedorov be brought back? Does he even want to? Should the team trade Theodore? Will they be able to trade Nylander? Will Karl Alzner be ready to play the whole season in the NHL? What's up with Jeff Schultz, Milan Jurcina, Brian Pothier, and John Erskine? I will give you my thoughts on that in the coming days. But tonight I am proud of my team. I am proud of Alex Ovechkin for the classy way he handled the final handshakes as well. He apologized to Sergei Gonchar and made sure to give credit to Crosby and company. Now while I think Crosby still whines a bit too much, you have to give the guy credit. He is awesome. That first goal where he kicked the puck to his stick was something nearly nobody else can do. I also am proud of the fans who stuck around to give the team a well deserved standing ovation despite the disappointment we all shared. So congrats Pens. You earned this one, but this will not be the last time we meet in the playoffs and next time, you better be ready because this team hopefully knows what it takes and next time, we will get ya!