The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!
The Washington Capitals end their season-longest five-game home stand on Sunday when they host the Boston Bruins at Verizon Center. It will be a clash of two teams that have passed one another on their respective journeys to the post season. The Caps are 12-12-2 since January 14th when they were 24-11-8 and only three points out of the Eastern Conference lead. They are now 36-23-10 and reside in eighth place in the East, holding the second wild card spot, seven points ahead of the ninth-place Ottawa Senators.
The Washington Capitals end their season-longest five-game home stand on Sunday when they host the Boston Bruins at Verizon Center. It will be a clash of two teams that have passed one another on their respective journeys to the post season. The Caps are 12-12-2 since January 14th when they were 24-11-8 and only three points out of the Eastern Conference lead. They are now 36-23-10 and reside in eighth place in the East, holding the second wild card spot, seven points ahead of the ninth-place Ottawa Senators.
Meanwhile, the Bruins passed the Caps for the first wild
card spot in the East with a 2-0 win over the Pittsburgh Penguins on Saturday
afternoon. It extended their consecutive
games streak earning points to eight (7-0-1).
The Bruins have played well, but
they have benefited from a bit of puck luck, too. Three of those seven wins in
the eight-game streak came in extra time, and a fourth – Saturday’s win over
Pittsburgh – was a one-goal game until Zdeno Chara scored into an empty net
with 37.7 seconds left in regulation.
Boston outscored their opponents by a 25-14 margin over those eight
games. Their special teams performed adequately,
the power play going 6-for-30 (20.0 percent) and the penalty kill going
20-for-25 (80.0 percent).
Boston has had enviable balance in their scoring over their
7-0-1 streak. Brad Marchand leads the
club with five goals in that span, and six other players have three apiece: Dan
Paille, Loui Eriksson, Ryan Spooner, David Pastrnak, Milan Lucic, and Zdeno
Chara. Spooner and Pastrnak each have
eight points to lead the Bruins in total scoring in this recent run.
Spooner started the season with the Bruins but was assigned
to Providence in the AHL after appearing in five games without recording a
point. He was recalled in late February,
and the second tour with the Bruins appears to have gone much better. In ten games since his recall he has points
in eight contests, going 3-6-9, plus-3.
Spooner has one career game against the Caps, going without a point in
the Caps’ 4-0 win in Boston on October 11th.
Pastrnak, the 25th overall pick of the 2014 entry
draft, has spent this season shuttling between the Providence Bruins in the AHL
and the parent club. His movements have
taken place on almost a monthly basis – assigned to Providence in October,
recalled in November; reassigned to Providence in December, recalled in January. The recall in January might have been the
charm. In his second and third games
following that recall he scored a pair of goals in each and recorded the
game-winning goal in each.. More
recently he has points in each of his last four games, seven of his last eight
contests, and 12 of his last 16 outings, going 5-8-13 in that span. He has not yet faced the Caps.
Since the 2012-2013 season, among goalies appearing in at
least 50 games overall, no goaltender has a better save percentage than Boston’s
Tuukka Rask (.927). His 2.13 goals
against average over that span trails only New Jersey's Cory Schneider (2.11) and St. Louis’
Brian Elliott (2.12). His 14 shutouts
trail only Washington’s Braden Holtby (15), Pittsburgh’s Marc-Andre Fleury
(15), and Montreal’s Carey Price (16).
Rask is just slightly off those numbers so far this season with a 2.26
goals against average (12th in the league) and a .924 save
percentage (10th), with three shutouts (tied for 15th). Over the Bruins’ recent 7-0-1 run, Rask has
found his rhythm. He is 5-0-1, 1.45,
.955 with one shutout. He is 1-4-3,
3.13, .883, with one shutout in eight career appearances against
Washington.
Rask’s shutout came in Saturday’s game against Pittsburgh,
which means Niklas Svedberg might get the call in net for Boston. His overall record is not extraordinary
(7-5-2, 2.43, .918), but he does have three wins and a no-decision in his last
four appearances. He has never faced the
Caps.
Here is how the teams compare overall:
1. Boston has an
ability to jump on teams early. They are
tied for sixth in goals scored in the first periods of games (61) and have a
plus-14 goal differential in the first period.
There is a bit of an odd quality to their first period scoring,
however. Only 27 times in 68 games have
the Bruins taken a lead into the first intermission, and they rank 19th
in winning percentage (.741/20-5-2).
2. No team has
enjoyed fewer power plays on the road than the Bruins (84). Only Minnesota (10), Montreal (10), and
Buffalo (9) have scored fewer power play goals on the road than Boston (11).
3. With 112 times
being shorthanded on the road, the Bruins are minus-28 in special teams
opportunity differential. In three road
games on this 7-0-1 run, they are plus-1 in special teams opportunity differential.
4. Three seems to be
the magic number for the Bruins. In
games in which they score three or more goals (not including trick shots), they
are 27-4-4.
5. The Bruins might
have a 7-0-1 record in their last eight games, but it has been the product of mixed
possession number results. Boston has a
Corsi-for percentage at overall 5-on-5 of just 48.5 over those eight
games. However, in close score
situations the Bruins Corsi-for percentage is 52.5 over those eight games.
1. What happened to
the home stand? The Caps are 1-3-0, and
while the goals, for and against, are even (10-10), six of those goals scored
came against the hapless Buffalo Sabres.
Only one of the other four goals scored in the three losses was scored
after the first period, and that was a window dressing goal scored with less
than two minutes left in the Caps’ 4-2 loss to Dallas on Friday.
2. It is nice that
the new guy is contributing, but having Curtis Glencross leading the team in
goals (3) and points (5) over a four-game stretch at home might not have been
in the game plan. He and Alex Ovechkin
account for five of the Caps’ 10 goals on the home stand. Five other players have one apiece: Brooks
Laich, Joel Ward, Jay Beagle, Evgeny Kuznetsov, and Marcus Johansson.
3. Washington has
been killing too many penalties at home.
They rank in a tie for fourth in the league in most shorthanded
situations on home ice (116).
4. The Caps’ first
period scoring is quite the opposite of that of the Bruins. Washington is tied for the sixth-fewest number
of first period goals this season (47).
5. Only the New York
Islanders in the Eastern Conference have generated more total shot attempts
this season (4489) than the Caps (4038).
As good as that might sound, the Caps are ranked just eighth in the East
in shot attempt differential (plus-143).
That is because the Caps have allowed the seventh-most number of shot
attempts against (3895).
The Peerless’ Players to Ponder
Boston: Zdeno Chara
On Wednesday, Zdeno Chara will turn 38 years old. Only seven of 291 defensemen having dressed
this season are older. While Chara is
hardly doddering on the eve of his next birthday, there are signs that age is
creeping into his game. His 0.38 points
per game this season is his lowest as a Bruin and his lowest since the
2001-2002 season in 75 games with the Ottawa Senators. While plus-minus is not an especially
persuasive indicator of performance, his plus-2 for the season would be his
lowest for a season since 2006-2007.
Drilling down a bit, his Corsi-for (relative) at 5-on-5 ranks 30th
in the league among defensemen (minimum: 500 minutes). While that is an improvement on his 53rd-place
ranking last season, it is a drop-off from his fourth-place ranking in the
Bruins’ Stanley Cup season of 2010-2011.
He still leads the team’s defensemen in shorthanded ice time (3:17), and
he is still logging significant minutes on the power play (2:06, third among
Bruins defensemen). Chara has three
goals in his last seven games; in 58 career games against the Caps he is
7-19-26, plus-10.
Washington: Nicklas Backstrom
With two assists against the Buffalo Sabres last Saturday, Nicklas
Backstrom tied Michal Pivonka for the franchise record in assists (418). In two games since, he has not added to that
total, but that seems understandable since he was fighting the flu last
week. Of more concern might be that he
has gone ten games without a goal and has only two in his last 18 games. The Caps are 24-11-7 this season when
Backstrom records a point, 9-1-4 when he scores a goal. He is in sight of his second-highest season
goal total (22 in 2008-2009), and he might have to challenge or surpass it if
the Caps are to hold on to a wild-card spot to qualify for the post
season. In 23 career games against the
Bruins, Backstrom is 4-19-23, plus-6.
In the end…
On February 21st the Caps defeated the New York
Islanders, 3-2, in a Gimmick. The win
left the Caps just five points out of the top spot in the Eastern Conference
and 12 points ahead of the ninth-place Florida Panthers.
They will take the ice on Sunday 11 points out of the conference lead
and just six points ahead of Florida for the last playoff spot,
the Panthers holding a game in hand. Ottawa is seven points back with the Senators
holding two games in hand. It is not
time for fans to panic over the Caps chances to reach the playoffs, but that
collar is getting a bit tight.
What makes things more serious for the Caps is that as they
embark on their last 13 games they get the Bruins twice, the New York Rangers
twice, Minnesota, Winnipeg, Nashville, Montreal, Detroit. That is nine games against teams that would
qualify for the playoffs today. Add in a
game against the Senators on April 4th, and the home stretch looks
more like a mine field. The Caps are
going to get a dose of playoff hockey over these last four weeks, and it starts
against the Bruins on Sunday.
Capitals 3 – Bruins 2