Capitals Practice Recap for 2/23/07

Brian Pothier and Boyd Gordon were the first to hit the ice at 9:52 AM. With that, here are your lines for today:

Red - Ovechkin, Zubrus, Brashear, plus Jurcina and Morrisonn
Yellow - Semin, Beech, Fehr, plus Pothier and Erskine
Teal - Pettinger, Gordon, Bradley, plus Schultz and Heward
White - Clymer, Sutherby, Zednik, plus Laich, Nycholat and Eminger
Goalies - Johnson and Cassivi

Chris Clark and Brian Muir both did not practice. Although Muir came out at the end and did some light skating. With Clark out it was interesting to see Brashear being called to fill in on the 1st line. We'll see how long that lasts. Remember earlier in the year he was put on the second line in a brief experiment that lasted about a period. Also something worth noting, Eric Fehr left practice just ten minutes in. The word is he is suffering from a slight groin injury.

Coach Glen Hanlon started out practice by preaching to the team the importance of not turning the puck over at their own blue line, and as a result that seemed to be the main focus of the practice.

The first drill involved each line of five practicing exiting their zone with precise passes. Next was a breakout 2 on 0 drill with shots on goal. This was followed by another breakout drill where a player would take the put at the blue line and shoot on goal while another player would stand in front of the goal and try to deflect the pass. After shooting, the original player would skate to the opposite end of the rink, retrieve a puck and fire an outlet pass for a breakaway.

A lot of time was spend during 2 on 2 breakout drills. There would be 1 forward and 1 defenseman on each pairing. Once you went on offense, you would then go on defense. It was a fast paced drill that again focused on bringing the puck up the ice and entering the offense zone without turning the puck over. This was followed by 5 on 2 drills that once again focused on exiting their own zone and generating an attack up ice.

We then moved on to working on the power play. Since Clark is out, a second defenseman has now been inserted into the top line. Pothier now takes the point position in the umbrella formation with Semin and Heward on each board. Zubrus is assigned to the front of the net while Ovechkin is a roamer. The second line has Jurcina paired up with either Clymer or Schultz to go along with Pettinger, Beech, and Zednik.

A fifteen minute session of shootouts finished up practice with the team split up into two squads. The losing team each time was forced to do sit ups, push ups, and jumping jacks. Ovechkin continued to struggle going 0 for 4 on the day.

After practice Zubrus and Ovechkin (pictured) were having a good time trying to recreate his famous goal from last season.

I don't think many people got the notice of the change in time to 10 am because there was maybe about five people there. However, people were trickling in around 11 with some still arriving as I was leaving at 11:30.