Tonight the Capitals will face the decisive game of their season. After weeks of injury troubles and youthful inconsistencies, the team finds itself in position to drop from twelfth in the East down to fourteenth, all in one night. The Capitals, who finished near the bottom of the league last season and retooled over the summer to perform better this season, are in a position to slip behind the Florida Panthers and Boston Bruins, who finished horribly last season and made no improvements.

The Florida Panthers fired their General Manager this summer after the team’s horrible start was further tripped up by injuries to ancient and distasteful acquisitions Todd Bertuzzi and Ed Belfour. Last week Belfour beat the Caps. We’re in no position to speculate about steroid use, even in the case of someone who’s always been reportedly keen on conditioning, and certainly not in the case of anyone who once assaulted a hotel guard when the latter prevented him from pursuing a woman. However, even with a potential competitive edge, no forty-one year old goalie should strike fear into the hearts of any professional hockey team, let alone one with two of the top eight goal scorers in the NHL.

Photograph of futility and absurdity at MCI center by Eli Resnick