Both teams came out a bit off their best, perhaps because neither had played a game since last Saturday, a four-day layoff that was a particularly difficult adjustment after a lockout-compressed, no-rest regular season.

WSJ: Ovechkin helps Capitals beat Rangers 3-1 in Game 1

"The biggest adjustment is I no longer live waiting for that ax to drop every day, " he says.

WSJ: As Kodak Fades, Rochester Develops Other Businesses

But some academics have been looking back at the 1920s to make comparisons with the present day and they find similarities both in the nature of the economic problems and the adjustment efforts designed to alleviate them.

WSJ: Brussels Beat: Parallels With 1920s Raise Worries Over Extremism