Little People Can Do Big Things Playoff Preview: The Forwards

Little People Can Do Big Things Playoff Preview: The Forwards

Playoffs!!! Ovie!!! Backstrom!!!! Our very own Lollipop Guild!!!! Brooks Fuckin Laich!!!! Travis Moen!!!! The possible return of Metro's powerplay goals!!!!

That's a lot of stuff to get through in the forwards preview, so we better get to it.

Look, we dropped a house on that bitch with the shoes, we sure as hell can score on Jose Theodore: The Habs are going as far as the Lollipop Guild and the rest of the runts take them, right? I mean, Jaro can be Jaro, the defence is expecting to get swamped, but they need to get to Theo/Varlamov and score goals to win this thing. Gainey's big makeover resulted in roughly two million "Hobbits/Munchkins/Ewoks/Roloff family" jokes from opposing fans this year but to paraphrase Norman Dale, "these are your forwards". Oh, and these are your Big Red Machine opponents forwards too:

Lollipop Guild vs Ivan Drago and friends: Gomez and Gionta, Cammy and Pleks, random assorted wingers (usually Chicken and Big Tits respectively, but sometimes Little Tits gets on the Pleks line, sometimes Travis Moen wanders up from the depth chart, even Metro when healthy is found mucking along a wing. I think Dominic Moore too.) These are the little, speedy wagons the Canadiens hitched their playoff lives to. Pleks started the year on fire and finished as leading scorer, almost pricing himself out of town, but since the Olympics has slowed considerably and might be tired. Cammy was full-value for his contract until he got hurt and had 26 goals despite missing 17 games, but has struggled since his return (2 assists in 11 games.) Big Tits is the new enigma: talented enough to be drafted ahead of (roll call) Zach Parise, Jeff Carter, Mike Richards, Corey Perry and Ryan Getzlaf, Dustin Brown and Brent Seabrook, but daft enough to zone out for weeks. An engaged Big Tits and on-target Cammalleri would go a long way to re-energizing Pleks. Gomez and Gionta found a perfect fit with Benoit Pouliot and the Giant Mexican Chicken produced some excellent hockey. Gionta is rapidly becoming every non-110% fans favourite for his guts, goals and leadership. 29 says slap the C on him now. 29 is right. Gionta missed 20 games with a broken foot and scored 28 goals ... tell me a full year of him and Cammalleri doesn't add a few more wins to the ledger. If the Habs top two lines can find the chemistry they both had at various points this season, and can add Metro back to fire away on the power play, they can score on the Caps. Which is a good thing because they are facing:

Ovie (50 goals, 109 points). And Backstrom (33 goals, 68 assists). And Semin (40 goals, 84 points). And Brooks Fucking Laich scored 25, Mike Knuble opened up more space for Ovie and Backstrom and potted 29, and Thomas Fleischman added 23. This is not your father's Dennis Maruk lead Capitals. The top two lines are fast and skilled and strong. On the plus side, Ovie was relatively quiet in the regular season versus Montreal. On the minus side, well, look at the freaking numbers up there.

Advantage: Unless the Habs all find their scoring touch at the same time, the top two lines are in tough trying to match Ovie and the rest. The Laich line is definitely not a pushover for whomever lines up against it.

The Rest: The bottom two lines of the Caps shouldn't really scare anyone ... unless the Habs bottom two lines play the rudderless mess they sometimes can. Maybe familiarity breeds confidence, but I don't see how the likes of a washed-up Brendan Morrison, Eric Belanger, Eric Fehr (his 21 goals notwithstanding), Jason Chimera, Matt Bradley and David Steckel are that much better than Dominic Moore, Metro, Travis Moen, workaholic Mathieu Darche, Mad Max (the good Mad Max, mind you) and the wild card, Little Tits. Sergei might be the key; there isn't anyone in either team's bottom six with anywhere near the talent he has, and if he can make plays, set Metro up in the slot, and offer some menace in the offensive zone, the bottom six of the Canadiens could cause some trouble to the Caps shaky d. I think.

Advantage: Having seen very little of the Caps this year, I'll say Montreal. But it won't matter if Ovie and Backstrom are playing Cheka to the Habs "enemies of the people" upstairs.

Other stuff: The Caps powerplay is lethal; the Habs powerplay (despite a protracted slump) finished second in the league to Washington. But Moore, Metropolit, Pleks, Gomez and Moen are far better at killing penalties than the Caps. Dominic Moore's speed in particular might go a long way to neutralizing some of the Caps big guns a man down. Something to think about.

Mike Green: Yeah, TECHNICALLY he's a defenseman. But I'm technically a Catholic and look where that gets you. Green sometimes looks like a fourth Caps forward since he skates like the wind, scores a lot, and sometimes neglects his own zone, so I'm talking about him. If the Caps are playing with Green as a de facto forward, the advantage goes way up.