The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Caps vs. Senators, January 16th

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! . . .

When the Capitals visit Scotiabank Place to take on the Ottawa Senators, the thought that will come to mind is, “reversal of fortune.” When Ottawa slunk away after taking a 6-2 spanking from the Caps on December 6^th, they did so with a 15-13-1 record, and folks were asking, “what’s happened to Ottawa?”

Well, over the 18 games since, the Senators are 11-6-1, not to mention 9-1-1 in their last 11. Meanwhile, the Caps – for whom that Senator game might have been the high point of the season – are 7-10-1 since that win over Ottawa.

In most respects, the “before and after” that December 6^th game aren’t that remarkably different for the Senators:

Goals for…before: 3.48/after: 3.33
Goals against…before: 2.94/after: 2.79
Power play…before: 16.6%/after: 22.7%
Penalty kill…before: 84.8%/after: 80.7%

But over their last 11 games . . .

Goals for…4.27
Goals against…2.18
Power play…25.0%
Penalty kill…90.2%

And, their big guns have boomed to life over the last 11 games. Dany Heatley is 8-12-20, +16 (that is not a misprint…+16). Daniel Alfredsson is 8-12-20, +12 (that’s not a misprint, either). Both Heatley and Alfredsson are better than a point-per-game over the course of their respective careers against the Caps. Even Chris Kelly, who The Peerless wagers maybe one Cap fan in 50 has actually heard of, is 5-10-15, +11 over the last 11 games (nope, no misprint there). They’ve been explosive, too -- in seven periods of hockey in these last 11 games they’ve scored at least three goals. At the moment, it is the Ottawa offense with which fans have become accustomed.

But it isn’t as if Ottawa is doing it just by ramming the puck down opponents’ throats. With only 24 goals allowed in their last 11 games, they’ve been stingy, too. And consistent -- only once have they yielded more than three goals in a game in this run (they won), and they have two shutouts, both by Ray Emery, who is 7-1-1 in his last nine decisions, 2.21, .926.

If there is one Senator who has struggled – and continues to – it is Andrej Meszaros. Last year, as a rookie, Meszaros was 10-29-39, +34. He is 5-19-24, -11 this year, and even in this latest run of Ottawa success is only 1-4-5, +1.

The key here for the Caps is to avoid precisely the thing to which they are vulnerable – allowing goals in bunches. In 18 games since last meeting Ottawa, the Caps have had 14 games in which they’ve allowed at least one multiple-goal period. They are 3-11-1 in those games (two of the wins were against Philadelphia; we’ll leave it the reader as to whether they should count). That they would lose such a large percentage of such games is hardly surprising, but the large number of games in which it occurred suggests a defensive slump.

And, of course, there is the matter of scoring first. Since the last Ottawa game the Caps are 4-1-1 when scoring first, 3-9-0 when giving up the first goal.

All this merely serves to explain the obvious – the Caps can’t let Ottawa get off to a fast start, and if the home team does score first, the Caps have to find a way to stop the bleeding right away. Ottawa is in a groove that could spell serious trouble right out of the gate for the Caps.

But hey, there is a silver lining here, and it wears a number “1.” Brent Johnson -- likely to get this start -- is 3-0-0, 0.91, .972 in four games against the Senators over his career. The Caps could use that kind of performance to right their own ship and perhaps start a run of their own.

As you might imagine, it says here that this is precisely what will happen...

Caps 3 – Senators 2.