Red Out at IIHF Worlds/Penguins Advance

Today was a bittersweet day for Cap's D-man Mike Green as he was named to the IIHF World Tournament All-Star team but his Team Canada fell to Russia in a hard-fought 5-4 OT battle. His team mates Alexander Ovechkin, Alexander Semin and Sergei Federov celebrated the victory along with Semin's contribution of 2 goals. The win was Russia's first gold in the tournament since 1993. Ottawa's Dany Heatly was also named to the tournament All-Star team with fellow Canadian Green and of course, our own AO. Caps fans are very proud of all of our hometown players and I personally hope that Mike Green gets the big fat contract he deserves this summer. We love #52!

To the Stanley Cup playoffs...the Penguins clinched a Stanley Cup final spot with a resounding 6-0 win over the Flyers today. The Pens exhibited their fire power and scoring depth with goals from Ryan Malone, Jordan Staal, Evgeni Malkin, Pascal Dupuis and Marian Hossa. And Sid, your facial growth is starting to come in nicely - you must have gotten sick of all the ribbing and joined "Stache Club for Men." The Flyers played a tough game and have much to be proud of (ugh - this pains me as a Caps fan to say)! Biron is a tremendous goalie and the team has risen from being at the bottom of the NHL to one of the top teams in the Eastern conference. The hockey mom will be in Philadelphia for a tournament (what else) soon and I plan on sampling several cheese steaks in honor of the Flyers' playoff run.

So we will have to wait and see what happens with the Western conference in tomorrow's rematch between the Stars and Red Wings. In the meantime, I recieved a new question from a female hockey newbie (Fake names are used to protect the innocent so we'll address her as Hockey Helga):

What is icing? Is it what that big John Deere tractor thing does at halftime?

Hockey Helga, icing is called when a player shoots the puck from his own half of the ice across the opposing team's goal line without it passing through any part of the goal crease (you'll normally the puck skid all the way across the ice and behind the goal). That John Deere tractor thingy (AKA The Zamboni) is used between periods to smooth the entire ice surface. As you can imagine the ice gets really scuffed up with the blades, sticks and pucks flying - kind of like my kitchen floor. I'm not sure what my kids don't understand about playng hockey in the house...especially in roller blades. Duh, I can't imagine why my wood floors look like $#%&*!

To sign off, I want to propose another toast to all of the fine Caps playing in the IIHF World Finals, the Pens and as always, to my fellow hockey moms and fantastic female hockey fans around the world!