Earlier this season, the Caps ranked first in the entire NHL - for about an hour, before the Ottawa Senators reclaimed the lead. Yesterday the Caps were tied for last place overall, and had spent two whole days in sole possession of last place in the Eastern Conference. The Senators, meanwhile, remained on top of the league with thirteen wins and one loss. Last night, with three of their top five wingers out injured, the Capitals beat the Senators in Ottawa by a score of 4-1.

They had plenty of motivation to win. Following Tuesday's loss at Atlanta, which put the Caps in last place, Alex Ovechkin said he couldn't (i.e., wouldn't) control whether he'd be back in town next year, according to blogger Eric McErlain. Ovechkin, a recent first-overall draft pick, is the most complete hockey player in the league, leading the team in shots, goals, points and hits, and the team apparently plans to build their future around him. There is an official limit on how much a team can pay any one player, and you only get so many first overall draft picks, so it's hard to see why a deal isn't completed yet.

In better news, the Caps successfully defended a workers' comp lawsuit from former Red Wings' first-overall draft pick and one-time Capital, Joe Murphy. City Paper reports that Murphy felt that he suffered a work-related injury when he was hit over the head with a bottle by the boyfriend of a woman he invited into his limousine on the way out of a bar he attended after finishing a Caps game in New York.

Speaking of high draft picks, alcohol, mistakes, women, limousines and courtrooms, former Caps wrecking ball (and fifth-overall pick) Scott Stevens has just been inducted into the Hall of Fame. The voters were clearly impressed by Stevens' role in three Stanley Cup championships with the New Jersey Devils. Of course, Caps fans remember Stevens just as well for an unfortunate incident with three stellar teammates and a 17 year-old girl who accused them all of sexual assault.

Only they know what really happened. Stevens was briefly, but widely thought to have attacked the intoxicated young lady. His name was left out of later allegations, which were eventually dropped. The damage had been done. After public outcry and a gigantic contract offer from the St. Louis Blues, Stevens left Washington without any objection from the Caps.

Stevens' $5 million salary with the Blues, at a time when Gretzky earned less, kicked off the spiral of salary escalation that team owners blame for the NHL lockout (the players, of course, blame the owners, who locked them out). Stevens also destroyed the career of the biggest hockey superstar to emerge in the 1990s, the equally pathetic Eric Lindros. Stevens gave Lindros a concussion from which the latter still reels today.

Every Caps fan has a different opinion on Scott Stevens' tenure in town and in the league, so it should be interesting to hear some reactions to this polarizing figure's enshrinement in Toronto. Thank goodness the Capitals' current emerging superstar is so much more level headed.