The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!
The Washington Capitals kick off a set of weekend
back-to-back games when they visit the New Jersey Devils on Friday night to
wrap up a three-game road trip. The Caps
come into the contest with eight wins in their last ten games and have not lost
a game in regulation to a team not from the state of Ohio (the Columbus Blue
Jackets) in more than a month, when they dropped a 4-1 decision to the New York
Rangers on November 20th. The
Devils come into this game having won two straight games, both in regulation,
the first time they won consecutive games in regulation since Games 7 and 8 in
mid-October and only for the fourth time overall all season.
Then and Now…
This will be the 215th meeting in the all-time
series between the Caps and the Devils.
Washington has a 111-75-15 (13 ties) record against New Jersey overall,
including its Kansas City Scouts and Colorado Rockies in carnations, and a 46-46-7
(seven ties) record on the road. Since
2005-2006, the Caps are 29-16-11 overall against the Devils and 13-10-4 on the
road. The Capitals were 3-1-0 against
New Jersey in last season’s series and are 16-1-2 in the last 19 games played
between the teams.
Active Leaders vs. Opponent…
Noteworthy Opponents…
Taylor Hall is gone.
He took his six goals and 25 points this season to Arizona to try and
help the Coyotes reach the playoffs. His
departure leaves the Devils with one player in double digits in goals and one
player with at least 20 points this season.
That would be Kyle Palmieri (13-8-21). Now
in his fifth season with the Devils after spending his first five seasons with
the Anaheim Ducks, Palmieri has been as consistent as a player can possibly
be. In those five seasons with the Devils he has
averaged 0.36 goals per game, never averaging less than 0.33 nor
more than 0.39 in any season. He had
averaged 0.68 points per game over his five seasons, never less than 0.64 nor
more than 0.71 in any season. He will
not wow anyone, but you can pencil him into the lineup and count on 20-25 goals
and 50 points or so.
This season, Palmieri is on a pace to post his first 30-goal
season (32), although his 20-assist pace would keep him hovering about that
50-point threshold. The problem, though,
and one that might be exacerbated with the departure of Hall, is that Palmieri’s
scoring has not been nearly enough. He
has goals in 11 games, and the Devils are 5-4-2 in those contests. He has points in 17 games, and the Devils are
8-5-4 in those games. But in the 16
games in which he does not have a point, New Jersey is 3-12-1. There just isn’t enough depth past Palmieri
to make up for his absence on the score sheet, and he is not a sufficiently
prolific scorer to make a difference between the Devils being a competitor and being a
lottery team. In 18 career games against
the Caps, Palmieri is 5-3-8, minus-1.
From 2009-2010 through last season, he was eighth among all
defensemen in goals scored (98), 11th in assists (310), 12th
in points (408), fifth in power play goals (45), fifth in power play points
(178). He finished sixth in voting for the Calder Trophy as a rookie, three
times he was a Norris Trophy finalist as top defenseman (winning once), twice
he was named to the first team of the NHL All-Star squad, and once named to the
second team. And then, P.K. Subban,
after six seasons a Montreal Canadien and three a Nashville Predator, became a
New Jersey Devil. Traded to New Jersey
by Nashville with Adam Helewka for Steven Santini, Jeremy Davies, a 2019 second-round
draft pick and a 2020 second-round draft pick, Subban was going to provide the
punch from the blue line to complement the young fire power the Devils were
assembling – Jack Hughes and Nico Hischier – along with Taylor Hall that would make the Devils playoff contenders.
And then, reality hit.
Subban was 2-3-5 in his first 12 games with his new club. Not jump off the page numbers, but not
bad. The Devils were not responding as a
group, though, going 3-5-4 in those 12 games.
It got worse. Over the next 21
games, leading up to Friday’s matchup with the Caps, the Devils went 8-12-1, they
fell out of touch with playoff contenders, and Hall was traded to the Arizona
Coyotes. Did we mention that Subban does
not have a point in those 21 straight games?
And is a minus-11? And is getting
more attention about his marketing activities and with whom he is keeping company than his production on the ice? It is
hard to believe that Subban, who is only a season and change removed from being
a second-team NHL All-Star and Norris finalist, has lost his game, but he
certainly seems lost on the ice for the moment in New Jersey. And if the Devils have any thoughts of moving
him as part of a more general sell-off, ridding themselves of a $9.0 million
cap hit that runs through the 2012-2022 season will be a difficult chore. In 25 career games against the Caps, Subban
is 1-7-8, minus-3.
Martin Brodeur, the all-time leader in games played (1,266),
wins (691), and shutouts (125) among goalies in NHL history, retired after the
2014-2015 season. Since then, eight
different goalies have dressed for at least one game for the Devils, and the
latest contestant to become the heir to Brodeur’s crease is MacKenzie
Blackwood. Taken in the second round of the
2015 Entry Draft (42nd overall), Blackwood was the second goalie
taken in that draft, after the Caps took Ilya Samsonov with the 22nd
overall pick in the first round.
Blackwood served a typical apprenticeship after being drafted, two more years of Canadian
junior hockey and two seasons in the AHL, before sticking with the Devils last
season as a rookie backup to Cory Schneider and Keith Kinkaid, neither of whom
are with the team at the moment (Kinkaid is with Montreal, Schneider is with
Binghamton in the AHL).
Blackwood has had the typical fits and starts of a young
goaltender, losing a couple, winning a couple, showing glimpses of what he
could be and falling into stretches where he struggles. He has not won more than two consecutive
decisions this season, although he has seemed to find himself of late. Despite a 2-1-1 record in his last five
appearances (one no-decision), he stopped 137 of 142 shots over that stretch
(.965 save percentage) and allowed more than one goal only once, stopping 33 of
35 shots in a 2-0 loss to the Dallas Stars on December 10th. Blackwood has faced the Caps twice in his
career, losing both games with a 3.02 goals against average and .895 save
percentage.
1. The Devils went to
the Stanley Cup final in 2012, losing to the Los Angeles Kings in six
games. Among the 30 teams playing in all
the seasons since, only two teams have fewer wins than the Devils (238) –
Arizona (235) and Buffalo (205).
2. Since that Cup
final, the Devils have been no stranger to extra time decisions, at least being
on the wrong end of them. The 88 extra
time losses they have over the last eight seasons is most in the league through
Wednesday’s games.
3. Never considered
an offensive powerhouse, the Devils have scored 1,386 goals over the last eight
seasons since their trip to the Cup final, fewer than any of the teams playing all of those seasons except
Buffalo (1,347). This season, they are
tied with Detroit for fewest goals scored (79 through Wednesday’s games).
4. The Devils have
been particularly bad in finishing games.
Their minus-20 goal differential in the third periods of games (21 goals
for, 41 goals against) is exceeded only by Detroit (minus-24).
5. New Jersey cannot
hold late leads at home. They are the
only team in the league with a winning percentage under .500 when leading after
two periods on home ice (.444/4-3-2).
1. Washington has six
losses in regulation this season. Five
of them were by three or more goals, three of those on home ice.
2. In the four games
to date following a loss by three or more goals, the Caps are 3-0-1.
3. Washington is the
only team in the league with a winning percentage over .500 when trailing on
the road after two periods (.600). Not
that they have trailed much, only five times in 19 road games, winning three
times.
4. The Caps have
seven empty net goals on the road this season, most in the league (Carolina has
five).
5. Washington could
do a better job of protecting the puck on the road. Their 185 giveaways are most in the league.
The Peerless’ Players to Ponder
New Jersey: Travis Zajac
Players come (P.K. Subban), and players go (Taylor Hall),
but Travis Zajac is the player who has been through just about everything with
the Devils. When he takes the ice on
Friday night against the Capitals, he will tie Scott Stevens for third place on
the all-time franchise list for games played (956). The 14-year veteran (all with New Jersey) is
fifth on the all-time franchise list for goals scored (190), seventh in assists
(327), fourth in points (517), fifth in power play goals (52), and tied for fourth
in shorthanded goals (11). Only six
forwards active in the league have logged more shorthanded minutes than Zajac
(1,757).
Now, Zajac is the second oldest player on the club at age 34
(defenseman Andy Greene is 37), and his production is lagging behind previous
years. With four goals in 33 games he is
on a pace to finish with ten, which would be his lowest total for any season in
which he played more than 50 games. His
ten points to date put him on a pace to finish with 25, which would match his
low for a season in which he played more than 50 gamees (25 points in 74 games
in 2014-2015). He, like a number of
teammates, seems to have worn down a bit in his production as the season wears
on. After going 1-3-4, plus-1, in his
first seven games, Zajac is 3-3-6, minus-4, in his last 26 games and has only
one point (a goal) in his last nine games.
He is 7-20-27, plus-1, in 46 career games against the Capitals.
Washington: Nick Jensen
Nick Jensen is on a long stretch of bad luck in the
offensive end of the ice. Dating back to
last season he has played in 55 games for the Caps, and he is still looking for
his first goal as a Capital. That’s 55
games, 58 shots on goal, and no red lights lit.
Had those 55 games been played in a single season, he would be only the
seventh Capital defenseman in team history to play in at least 55 games in a
season without scoring a goal (Rod Langway, Joe Reekie, and Brooks Orpik all
did it more than once; Peter Anderson, Rick Berry, and Randy Holt were the
others). It is not as if he has been
incapable of getting shots to the net; he has shots on goal in 20 of 35 games
played this season, including a high of five shots on goal against Anaheim last
month.
In the context of this game, it gets worse for Jensen, or he
is long past due, depending on how one wants to look at it. Jensen has one goal scored in 127 career
games played on the road (February 19, 2017, against Pittsburgh). Only two active defensemen have played more
road games with as many or fewer goals – Vancouver’s Troy Stecher (one goal in
128 career road games) and Detroit’s Patrick Nemeth (one goal in 141 career
road games). Jensen is 1-1-2, plus-2, in
nine career games against New Jersey.
In the end…
The Caps score more than a goal per game more than the
Devils, and they allow more than half a goal per game less than New
Jersey. The Caps’ power play is almost
ten percentage points better than the Devils.
They have six goals scorers in double digits to one for New Jersey. They have seven players with at least 20
points to one for the Devils. Even
accounting for venue, the Caps being on the road, this game should not be
close. Then again, that’s why they play
the games.
Capitals 5 – Devils 2
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