The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!
The Washington Capitals head into the great unknown on
Thursday night when they take on the New York Islanders. No, not into a black hole in space or into the deepest
depths of the ocean, but to Barclays Center in Brooklyn, at which they will make
their first ever appearance.
The Caps will visit Brooklyn having righted themselves, or
so they hope, after stubbing their toe with a pair of losses to close last
week. Their 3-2 win over the Boston
Bruins was a solid road game that they will hope to replicate against a team
with whom they fought a hard, seven game series in the first round of last
season’s playoffs.
On the other side, the Islanders have been doing some
“righting” of their own. After a stretch
in which they lost four of five games ending with a 3-1 loss at home to the
woeful Toronto Maple Leafs on December 27th, they have won three of their last
four contests, two of those wins coming on the road (in Toronto and in
Buffalo), and the third win coming in their last outing, a 6-5 win over the
Western Conference-leading Dallas Stars.
This mini-stretch of four games has been a bit of an odd
ride. The offense is inconsistent and
unsettled, bracketing six-goal performances against Toronto and Dallas around
sparse two-goal efforts in Buffalo (2-1 win) and in Pittsburgh (in a 5-2
loss). Meanwhile, the Isles defense and goaltending has been, if anything, more consistently
bad in this run. They allowed three or
more goals in three of the four games (five goals twice), and their penalty
kill has been dreadful, going 12-for-16 (75.0 percent). That last statistic is made worse by the fact
that all four opponent power play goals were scored in the last three games on
just 12 attempts, a 66.7 percent penalty kill rate.
On an individual, “who’s hot, who’s not” basis, there isn’t so much a “hot” Islander as
there is some balance over the last four games.
Six different players have two goals apiece: Cal Clutterbuck, Anders
Lee, Frans Nielsen, Nikolay Kulemin, John Tavares, and Kyle Okposo.
All that is very nice for the Islanders, but it does leave a
question of what’s up with Ryan Strome?
Last season, in his first full season with the club, Strome struck for
17 goals in 81 games. One could envision
a leap forward for the 22-year old, former fifth overall draft pick this
season. It has not happened. Strome is on a pace to finish with roughly
the same number of assists this year (31) that he had last season (33), but his
goal scoring has dried up. He has only
three goals in 29 games this season and comes into this game on a 14-game
streak without a goal. He is 1-4-5,
minus-1, in five career games against the Caps.
At another level of disappointment is the season John
Tavares is having. Being in the top-50
scorers among 776 skaters to have dressed for games this season is not the
profile of a bad player, but it is not the level of production expected of
Tavares, either. He is the Islanders’
leading goal scorer and is second in points (15-14-29), but both his goals and
assists are well below the pace he set when he finished fourth in the league in
goals (38), tied for ninth in assists (48), and second in points (86). He has shown recent signs of ramping up his
production to levels to which we are more accustomed. Tavares is 2-4-6 in his last six games. He is 10-10-20, plus-3, in 21 career games
against the Caps.
Here is how the teams compare overall:
1. The recent penalty
killing problems are a bit odd, given that the Islanders are second in the
league in penalty killing (85.6 percent).
It is an especially odd problem given that before the leaky last three
games, the Islanders went 15 straight games without allowing a power play goal
(35-for-35). What they have been is
stingy allowing power play goals at home.
Only Montreal and Chicago (five apiece) have allowed fewer than the
Islanders (seven).
2. The Islanders sure
are “Team Meh.” They rank in the middle
third in so many statistical categories… Power play (17th/18.8 percent), shots
per game (14th/29.8), shots against per game (11th/30.4), faceoff winning
percentage (15th/50.0), winning record in one-goal games (T-14th/10-5-5), wins
when outshooting opponents (T-14th/10).
It is the profile of a team that neither does things especially well,
nor especially poorly.
3. What the Islanders
can do is mount comebacks. An 8-10-3
record when allowing the first goal does not look impressive, but it is the
fifth best such record in the league.
But those comebacks don’t occur late in games. The Islanders are 1-10-2 when trailing after
two periods, tied for the seventh-worst record in the league. Only four teams are without a win when
trailing after 40 minutes, making that one win look even worse.
4. The Islanders seem
to have problems with some basic aspects of the game, at least so far as bench
management is concerned. Only two teams
have more bench minor penalties that the Islanders (7): San Jose (8) and
Detroit (9).
5. New York has a
rather pronounced difference in their possession numbers as far as ranking is
concerned. They are 21st in
Corsi-for at 5-on-5 in away games this season (47.3 percent), but they rank 11th
in the same statistic at home (51.9 percent; numbers from war-on-ice.com).
1. Washington plays
the front runner role very well. No team
has more wins when scoring first (21), they are one of three teams with a perfect
record when leading after one period (13-0-0; New Jersey and Philadelphia are
the other perfect teams), and no team has more wins when leading after two
periods (20).
2. Folks probably
know by now that Alex Ovechkin is four goals away from 500 for his career. Not as many folks might know that Jason
Chimera is four assists from 200 in his career.
3. There are 26 active
goaltenders with at least 20 career shutouts. Braden Holtby is one of them (22),
and he has played in at least 35 fewer games than any of the other 25.
4. Nicklas Backstrom
is putting together a quietly efficient season as a goal scorer. He is on a pace to finish with 25 goals,
which would be the second highest total of his career, and his 18.0 shooting
percentage is a career best to date.
5. Washington’s
possession numbers on the road have really deteriorated of late. In their last 13 away games their Corsi-for
is 45.4. Over that period they were over
50 percent just three times, at Winnipeg on December 5th (a 2-1
overtime loss), at Buffalo on December 28th (a 2-0 win), and at
Boston on Tuesday (a 3-2 win; numbers from war-on-ice.com).
The Peerless’ Players to Ponder
New York: Jaroslav
Halak
Jaroslav Halak last appeared in a game for the Islanders on
December 21st, allowing two goals on 29 shots in a 5-2 win over the
Anaheim Ducks. Since then he has been on
the shelf with an upper body injury. He
was taken off the injured reserve list on Tuesday, meaning he could return to
action against the Caps on Thursday.
Thomas Greiss has not played poorly in his absence, his 3.33 goals
against average more a function of high shot volumes faced (40.0 shots per 60
minutes), although his save percentage of .917 is middle-of-the-pack. Getting Halak back would seem important to
keep the Islanders from losing contact with the Caps in the Metropolitan
Division standings entirely (they trail by 12 points). Halak has been solid this season with a
10-6-3, 2.09, .923 record with two shutouts. He was slightly better than that
leading up to his injury, going 5-2-2, 2.04, .926 in his most recent nine
appearances. Halak is 6-4-0, 2.67, .896
in ten career regular season appearances against the Caps.
Washington: Dmitry Orlov
Dmitry Orlov’s offensive production has been promising on
one level. He has already tied his goal
output of the last season in which he played for the Caps (3, in 54 games in
2013-2014), and he has surpassed his point production from that season (11)
with his 14 points to date. On another
level, he might need to strive for more consistency. Over his last 22 games he has had a four game
points streak (3-2-5), an eight game streak without a point, four assists over
a four-game span, and a five-game streak without a point before he recorded an
assist against Boston in Tuesday’s 3-2 win.
He has one goal in seven career games against the Islanders.
In the end…
If the Islanders allow shot volumes to the Caps in the same
fashion as they have recently – three straight games allowing 40-plus shots, an
average of 39.6 over their last five games – this game will not end well for
the hosts. That argues for the Caps
applying pressure from the opening puck drop to force the Islanders into a
defensive crouch. The Caps have had some
issues scoring in recent games, scoring fewer than three goals in three of
their last seven games, but this could be an opportunity to improve on their
scoring statistics.
Capitals 5 – Islanders 2
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