Green Finally Speaks up about the Playoffs

Defenseman Mike Green of Washington Capitals breaks his silence about being eliminated early in the Stanley Cup Playoffs in the first round.  Obviously, Green was disappointed with how their game against the Montreal Canadiens turned out.  He admitted feeling so frustrated that he chose not to speak up for fear that the might say the wrong things and perhaps regret them. Now that he has cooled down and was able to look more closely at what happened during the first round of the playoffs, he admitted that the criticisms on the team’s weaker defensive play affected his game.  To this, Green said that he was actually looking forward to the playoffs and he wanted to play strong on the defensive side, especially since he was criticized about it.  Green is known to be a strong offensive player, but focusing more on defense perhaps did affect his offense badly.  He had difficulty adjusting and trying to live up to the expectations. A couple of disappointments for Green Before the playoffs disappointment for the Washington Capitals, Green ranked high as a leader of NHL defensemen by scoring a total of 19 goals and 76 points during the regular season.  In the 7-game loss, which led to the Montreal Canadiens’ victory, Green didn’t perform just as well in such a crucial moment for the team.  He was only able to make 3 assists and made a plus-1 rating. Just a month ago, April 3 to be exact, the Washington Capitals defenseman suffered from an injury on his wrist in Columbus.  Although the wrist injury didn’t require a surgery, perhaps another disappointment for Green is that he had to miss the World Championship to represent team Canada.  This also didn’t help in any way to the recent turn of events in the playoffs. On the team’s rather poor performance during the playoffs Green doesn’t want to make any excuse for their elimination in the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.  He admitted that perhaps the team were too confident on their power play that did well the whole season.  With a record of 25 percent for the two and a half years, they didn’t expect that it won’t work this time.  So when the Canadiens were able to thwart their power play, this had a bad effect on the team.  Apparently, according to Green, they didn’t adjust well. The frustrating outcome of the game can also be attributed to their slow start, which the Canadiens took advantage of, especially during the first 10 to 15 minutes.  Though eager to make a return and score goals for the team, the Capitals had difficulty playing good offense against the goaltender and failed to score. Though upset, Green doesn’t want to blame his coach Bruce Boudreau.  The Washington Capitals defenseman even defended his coach and said that the the system worked well.  He was under the same system when they won the AHL championship in his first year as pro with the coach.  In fact, the same system made them one of the leading teams during the regular season of the NHL.  The criticisms about the team during the regular season are not the same with the playoffs.   During the regular season, critics pointed out the they were not able to play a strong defensive game, although they scored goals.  In the playoffs, however, they were able to make strong defense by limiting the opponent’s shots per game, but wasn’t able to make goals like before.