I don't dislike Crosby. Never said that. But I think the difference between him and his peers is often overblown as a result of his team success. Put Ovi on Pittsburgh, they probably have 3 cups still with Ovi-Malkin. McDavid? Same thing. McDavid-Malkin 1-2 punch, if they were of similar age, would also likely have 3 cups. Crosby doesn't beat Ovi and the Caps btw, the Penguins do. If you look at head-to-head playoff stats, Crosby and Ovi have extremely similar numbers recently. But Crosby, while his linemates may be slightly subpar currently, plays for a much deeper team than Ovi does. Pittsburgh without Crosby is still a playoff team as far as I'm concerned. Washington without Ovi? Nope.
In any case, I think this is the year the Caps finally get past the Pens, so we'll have to just wait and see
The notion that historically Crosby plays on a better team is so easy to refute and especially given the respective players have played their entire careers the identical years.
Through 13 seasons this is the Pens regular season record in the Crosby era;
Primary team Pittsburgh: 583-342-57-50 in these games.
Goals for Pittsburgh: 3243
Goals against Pittsburgh: 2897
This is the Caps record same time frame for OV era;
Primary team Washington: 564-343-60-65 in these games.
Goals for Washington: 3150
Goals against Washington: 2915
Theres virtually no difference. The Pens have 19 more wings through 1032 GP. That's a very slight difference. But the Caps have 18 more OT 3 pt results so in Pts the teams are virtually identical across 13 seasons. All in the Pens on average have one rounded off point more than the Caps per season. One point!
Except in the playoffs theres a huge difference in the clubs. Suddenly it looks like this;
Pens;
Primary team Pittsburgh: 96-68 in these games.
Goals for Pittsburgh: 505
Goals against Pittsburgh: 428
Caps;
Primary team Washington: 51-53 in these games.
Goals for Washington: 266
Goals against Washington: 258
So note two things in this;
1) Pens play a lot more playoff games, have had much more playoff success advancing into rounds and 3 cups.
2) The Pens record in the playoffs is night and day different than the Caps who are a dominant team in regular season, perennially, but are sub .500 in the playoffs.
But one of the reasons for that is the Caps losing to the Pens in the playoffs everytime during the Crosby-OV era. heh
btw todays game might be immaterial. Pens already got the split they were looking for. This Pens team isn't going to roll like Columbus did. I figure the Caps win this game 6-1 and the Pens roll up their sleeves the rest of the series.