The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!
The Washington Capitals return to home ice on Sunday afternoon
to host the San Jose Sharks in a matchup of teams who got their 2020 schedules
off to a good start with wins. The Caps
will be trying to use their win over Carolina on Saturday as a foothold on
which to return to their winning ways, while the Sharks are hoping their overtime win over Pittsburgh signals a reversal from a disastrous December that saw them sink out of sight
of a playoff spot.
Then and Now…
Sunday will mark the 45th time these teams have
met, the Caps holding a 15-24-4 (one tie) record in the series to date, 7-11-4
on home ice. Since 2005-2006, Washington
is 7-11-4 against the Sharks overall and 2-4-4 in DC. The Caps go into this game with a five-game
points streak against the Sharks (4-0-1).
Active Leaders vs. Opponent…
Noteworthy Opponents…
San Jose had a ghastly December, going 2-9-2, the worst
record in the league for the month. They
were awful on both sides of the puck, their 27 goals tying Detroit for fewest
in December, their 47 goals allowed tying Ottawa for sixth-most allowed. On the offensive side of the puck, they just
did not get much production from their old guard. Patrick Marleau and Joe Thornton, who have
combined for almost 1,000 goals (972) and more than 3,300 games played (3,303)
in their respective careers, combined for two goals, one apiece, in 13 games in
December. Thornton has been more of a
set-up man in his career, seventh all-time in career assists in the NHL
(1,080), but that one goal he had in December is his only goal this
season.
It is part of a late-career drop-off in goal scoring for the
22-year veteran, who has 37 goals over his last 241 games over the last three
and a half seasons. His assists are down
as well, the 15 he has in 42 games being his lowest on a per-game basis (0.36
assists per game) since his sophomore season in the NHL, in 1998-1999, when he
averaged 0.31 assists per game in 81 games for the Boston Bruins. Is Thornton coming out of his half-season
slump? He has points in three of his
last four games (1-3-4), but he had points in three of four games (0-3-3) in
late November before going 0-3-3 in his next 11 games. His production tracks with his ice time, to a
point, the 14:37 in ice time per game being the lowest of his career. The 40-year old Thornton, who contemplated
retirement last summer, is on a one-year contract this season at $2.0 million,
and one cannot but wonder if it is the last one he will have with the Sharks. In 47 career games against the Capitals, he
is 17-32-49, plus-9.
Marleau is the all-time franchise leader, or close to it, in
a lot of offensive categories – games played (1,531/1st), goals
(515/1st), assists (582/2nd), points (1,097/1st),
power play goals (161/1st), shorthanded goals (17/1st), and
game-winning goals (99/1st).
He has only seven goals in 38 games so far this season, the 0.18 goals
per game being his lowest output since he averaged 0.18 goals per game in 74
games in his rookie season with the Sharks in 1997-1998. The same applies for his assist production,
his 0.21 assists per game being the lowest of his career. Like Thornton, production and ice time have a
relationship with Marleau. He is averaging
15:33 per game, his lowest ice time per game since he averaged 14:04 with the
Sharks in 2001-2002.
Marleau started the season respectably, posting six point in
his first six games (2-4-6). But then,
he recorded only five points in his next 17 games (4-1-5) and followed that up
with an 11-game streak without a point.
He has been more visible of late, going 1-3-4 in his last four games
heading into the Sunday contest.
Marleau, who has spent most of his career with the Sharks, returned this
season to the club after spending two seasons with the Toronto Maple
Leafs. The Leafs traded him to the Carolina Hurricanes last June with a conditional first round pick and a 2020
seventh round pick for a sixth-round pick.
Carolina subsequently bought Marleau out, and he signed a one-year/$700,000
deal in October to return to San Jose.
He, like Thornton a 40-year old (they are the second and third oldest
players in the league), might be playing on his last contract as well. In 34 career games against Washington,
Marleau is 9-14-23, plus-4.
Through Friday, 40 goaltenders logged at least 1,000 minutes
this season. Among them, Martin Jones
ranked 34th in goals against average (3.13) and 38th in
save percentage (.893). He was last in
the league in even strength save percentage (.886) among all goalies appearing
in at least ten games. It has to be of
considerable concern for the Sharks, who have seen Jones’ goals against average
rise from 2.27 in his first year with the club (2016-2017, after arriving from
the Los Angeles Kings), and his save percentage drop from .918 that same
season. If he finishes this season with a save percentage under .900, it will
be his second straight season under that threshold.
December was unkind to Jones, who was either bad or unlucky,
or both. He was 1-7-0, 3.45, .882 in
eight games, but twice he had game save percentages of .935 or better and lost,
a 3-1 loss to Nashville in which he allowed two goals on 31 shots, and his last
appearance in which he stopped 21 of 22 shots in a 2-0 loss to Detroit on New
Year’s Eve. Jones has struggled on the
road, where he is 3-8-1 (one no-decision), 3.34, .889 in 13 appearances. Jones lost all four of his decisions in
December on the road with a 3.04 goals against average and a .896 save
percentage. In nine career appearances
against the Caps, Jones is 5-4-0, 2.79, .904.
It is worth noting, though, that after shutting out the Caps in his
first two visits to Washington with the Sharks, he stopped only 58 of 68 shots
(.853 save percentage) in his last two visits to DC, splitting two decisions.
1. San Jose’s power
play on the road in December would have a hard time keeping an appliance bulb
lit. They were 1-for-16 (6.3 percent),
the worst power play on the road in the league in December.
2. How many players
would you have gone through on the Sharks roster before settling on Kevin
Labanc as the Shark with the only power play goal on the road for December
(against Florida)?
3. In going 0-4-1 on
the road in December, the Sharks never led at either intermission in the five
games. They allowed the first goal in
all five games as well.
4. In five road games
in December, San Jose scored a total of five goals, no Shark with more than
one.
5. No Shark had a
multi-point game on the road in December.
1. The Caps might be
happy to get at least a couple of home games this week. Only Los Angeles and Montreal had fewer home
games in December (four apiece) than the Caps (five).
2. The Caps were
21-for-21 killing penalties on home ice in December, the only team with a
perfect penalty kill on home ice for the month.
3. The flip side of
that is that the Caps were shorthanded 4.20 times per game on home ice in
December, most in the league.
4. Odd stat… the Caps
had a “net” penalty kill of over 100 percent in December, owing to the fact
that they had one shorthanded goal scored, thus leaving them with a net penalty
kill for the month of 104.8.
5. In five games on
home ice in December, the Caps never held a lead after one period, the only
team in the league failing to do so.
The Peerless’ Players to Ponder
San Jose: Brent Burns
Over a five-year period ending with the 2018-2019 season,
Brent Burns put up some impressive statistics from the blue line. He was tied for second in games played among
defensemen (410, trailing Keith Yandle’s 412), first in goals by a wide margin
(101 to 84 for Oliver Ekman-Larsson), tied with Erik Karlsson for most assists
(260), first in points by a wide margin (361 to 326 for Karlsson), first in
even strength goals (65), third in power play goals (34), second in
game-winning goals (20), and third in minutes played (10,252).
This season, though, the numbers have slipped some in tandem
with just about everyone else on the team.
His seven goals in 42 games (0.17 per game) is slightly off last year’s
pace (0.20 goals per game), while his assists have fallen off more (from 0.82
per game to 0.50 per game), as have his points (from 1.01 per game to
0.67). An important offensive weapon
with a deadly shot, he has seen his shots drop off as well. Averaging 2.86 shots per game, Burns has his
lowest average since recording 2.70 shots per game with the Sharks in
2012-2013. He has been more active and
more productive lately, though, averaging 3.71 shots per game over his last
seven contests while going 2-5-7. Burns
is 6-11-17, minus-2, in 19 career games against the Caps.
Washington: Garnet Hathaway
Fourth liners are supposed to be “energy” guys who can
aggravate, stimulate, occasionally intimidate, and chip in some offense from
time to time. Garnet Hathaway was just
that in December. He had, for a fourth
liner, good offensive production (4-1-5 in 13 games), his lone goal being the
game-winner in a 5-2 win over Tampa Bay on December 14th. He had a two-point game (both goals) against
the Sharks to open the month, his only multi-point game this season. His 23.5 percent shooting (four goals on 17
shots) was best on the club. He had 25
penalty minutes (second on the team to Tom Wilson’s 34) and 32 hits, he and
Wilson the only players to post the double of at least 30 hits while logging at
least 25 penalty minutes. And Hathaway
did all this while averaging just 10:33 in ice time per game (only Brendan
Leipsic averaged less among Caps with at least five games: 9:20).
It would be a plus if Hathaway could bring his home
production up to what he has accomplished on the road, although he is hardly
alone among Capitals in that regard. On
the road, he is 4-4-8 (including his game-winning goal), plus-7, in 22 games,
but on home ice so far he is 2-2-4, minus-1, in 17 games. He has only one point in his last 12 games at
Capital One Arena. That was a game in
which he displayed his feisty side as well.
He has an assist and 15 penalty minutes in a 5-2 win over Anaheim on
November 18th. You might also
remember that this was the game in which he squared off with the Ducks’ Erik
Gudbranson, his actions leading to a game misconduct penalty and a three-game suspension for “intent to injure/spitting.”
Not that Hathaway has been a shrinking violet against the Sharks. In 11 career games against San Jose, he is
3-3-6, plus-1, with 24 penalty minutes.
In the end…
The Sharks are a mess.
They fired head coach Peter DeBoer after starting the season 15-16-2,
but they have not done any better under Bob Boughner (3-5-1). They are a poor road team (7-10-2/25th
in points percentage), their 3-2 overtime win in Pittsburgh on Thursday
notwithstanding. They will play in
Columbus on Saturday afternoon before arriving in Washington for the fourth
game of a five-game road trip, playing their third game in four days.
The Caps have been teetering on shaky skates themselves over
the past couple of weeks, a victim of a pace that would be hard to sustain over
a long season and a bug that seemed to be working its way through the
team. But given the choice between where
these teams are, the condition in which they find themselves, and what direction
they are headed, the Caps are the better bet.
Capitals 5 – Sharks 2
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