In the '70s, the Washington Capitals were one of the worst teams in the NHL. In 1974, their first year in existence, they won just eight games, losing 67 and tying five. That season's winning percentage of .131 remains the worst in hockey history. We had the misfortune of being at the Capital Center in Largo, Maryland to watch some of their horrible defeats through the '80s. We also witnessed a few of their wins, and when you're team is so bad they usually lose, any sort of win warrants celebration comparable to that of most teams winning the Stanley Cup.
Although we left D.C. years ago, we stood by our home team, as all dedicated sports fans must do lest they be guilty of treason on the level of divulging military secrets. Fortunately, as the decades passed, the Caps improved, landing playoff births in 1983 and 1986. Over the next 17 years, the team made the playoffs several more times, but was usually eliminated in the first round.
But now, for the first time since 2003, when they lost in the conference quarterfinals, the Washington Capitals are playoff bound! To celebrate their playoff birth, D.C. band Darkest Hour have recorded the team a fight song, "Let's Go Caps," which they've modeled after the track Pantera once penned for the Dallas Stars.
"If you listen, the song is actually a spin-off of an older Darkest Hour song called "With 1,000 Words to Say But One," guitarist Mike Schleibaum told the Washington Post's Express. "This is on purpose. It's in homage to Pantera, who did that with their song "Cowboys From Hell" and their Dallas Stars theme."
Schleibaum said the band decided to record the Caps tribute -- which features some killer riffs and a nice guitar lead, but some pretty non-existent lyrics: "Let's go Caps (repeated ad nauseam)/ Let's go!/ Let's go!/Capitals/ Washington Capitals." (click "more" to hear the song) Read more...
