The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!
Having taken a 6-2 pasting at the hands of the Pittsburgh
Penguins on Sunday evening, the Washington Capitals have to get back up, shake
themselves off, and jump back on the horse on Tuesday night against the Ottawa
Senators at Canadian Tire Center.
The Caps come into this game again trying to avoid losing
consecutive games in regulation for the first time this season. That is something we have been saying a lot
recently. That is because the Caps come
into this game with a 7-5-1 record over their last 13 games. It has not been an easy go of it for the
Caps, who have been outscored, 35-32, in those 13 contests.
Meanwhile, Ottawa’s slim playoff hopes are almost
extinguished. With nine games to play,
the Senators find themselves seven points out of a wild-card berth, and the
Detroit Red Wings, who hold that seven-point lead, also hold a game in hand on
the Senators. Ottawa simply has not been
able to step up in the 2016 portion of the season, going 16-17-2 in the new
year. They have not won consecutive
games in regulation time since they beat Toronto and Tampa Bay in early
February (although they will have a chance to do just that against the Caps
after beating Montreal, 5-0, last Saturday).
Scoring has not been a problem for the Senators, who are
averaging 2.77 goals per game in the 2016 portion of the season. Scoring defense and special teams are another
matter. Ottawa has allowed an average of
3.03 goals per game over their last 35 games, which goes along with a penalty
kill that has been ineffective, to say the least – 74.2 percent over that same
span of games. The power play has not
been any better, converting only 13.7 percent of its chances over those same 35
games.
Ottawa’s problem, in part, has been not getting scoring when
they need it from players that need to provide it. Case in point – Mike Hoffman. After posting 27 goals in 79 games last
season, Hoffman was on a pace to improve upon that with 24 goals in his first
52 games. However, he has just two goals
in his last 17 games, one his last 11 contests.
In five career games against the Capitals, Hoffman is 1-1-2, even.
Another example of underperforming is a more persistent
one. Bobby Ryan just has not lived up
the promise as a goal scorer that he displayed when he had four consecutive
30-plus goal seasons for the Anaheim Ducks.
In his third year as a Senator, Ryan appears once more as if he could
fall short of the 25-goal mark after scoring 23 in 70 games in his first year
in Ottawa and 18 goals in 78 games last season.
He is on a pace for 25 goals, but like Hoffman is coming up short as the
season winds down. Ryan has just three
goals in his last 20 games. In 13 career
games against Washington, he is 6-4-10, minus-6.
Dion Phaneuf has to wonder into what sort of situation he
has been dropped. Traded to the Senators
by the Toronto Maple Leafs as part of a nine-player deal in early February, he
arrived in time for the Senators to fall into a swoon that leaves their playoff
hopes almost non-existent. In the 19
games played since he arrived, Ottawa is just 9-8-2, and his contribution has
been limited to a goal and seven assists while averaging 23:31 in ice time per
game. He is not nearly the offensive
threat he was in his early days with the Calgary Flames when he posted 65 goals
and 206 points over his first four seasons.
He has not recorded double-digits in goals since finishing with 12 in
2011-2012 with Toronto, which was also his last 40-point season (44 in 82
games). In 20 career games against the
Capitals, Phaneuf is 1-8-9, minus-8.
Here is how the teams compare overall:
1. Ottawa comes into
this game having failed to record a power play goal in nine straight games
(0-for-23).
2. Erik Karlsson
leads all NHL defensemen in multi-point games this season with 20. Pittsburgh’s Kris Letang is next with 15.
3. Ottawa is a very
good team when they score first; they have the fifth-best winning percentage in
the league when doing so (.808). The trouble
is, they don’t score first very much.
Only Toronto has scored the first goal of a game fewer times (23) than
the Senators (26).
4. Early and late,
the Senators’ defense and goaltending leaves much to be desired. They have allowed the second-most number of
first period goals this season (67, to Winnipeg’s 68), and they have allowed
the league’s third-highest number of third period goals (80, behind Columbus’
84 and Vancouver’s 85).
5. Ottawa’s struggles
are reflected in their possession numbers, their Corsi-for at 5-on-5 overall ranking
25th in the league (47.5 percent).
Their score-adjusted Corsi-for ranks a bit lower – 26th at
46.7 percent. They are a bit better at
home, ranking 22nd in overall Corsi-for at 5-on-5 (49.3 percent) and
24th in score-adjusted Corsi-for (47.5 percent; numbers from
war-on-ice.com).
1. When the Caps lost
to the Penguins, 6-2, on Sunday it was the third game in the last five in which
they allowed four or more goals. They
had only allowed four or more goals 11 times in their previous 66 games.
2. The Capitals are
one of two NHL teams having allowed fewer than 60 goals in each of the three
regulation periods this season (56 in the first, 50 in the second, and 57 in
the third). Pittsburgh is the other
team.
3. The Caps are the
only team in the NHL with a team shooting percentage over 10 percent
(10.3). Dallas is second at 9.9 percent,
as is Ottawa.
4. Intermissions
matter for the Caps. If they lead at either one, they win. They are the only team without a regulation
loss when leading after one period (19-0-0) and when leading after two periods
(34-0-1).
5. The Caps are going
to want to improve their possession numbers on the road. In their last nine games they were at or
under 50 percent Corsi-for at 5-on-5 overall with a cumulative Corsi-for of 48.3
percent. These nine road games have been
accompanied by a weak PDO, the Caps finishing seven of those games under 100.0,
three times under 95.0. As one might
expect, only twice in those nine games did the Caps have a 5-on-5 goal
differential in positive territory, both times at plus-1 (numbers from war-on-ice.com).
The Peerless’ Players to Ponder
Ottawa: Craig Anderson
No goaltender faces more rubber Craig Anderson. Among 38 goalies with 1,500 or more minutes
played this season, Anderson has faced 33.3 shots per 60 minutes, more than a
full shot per 60 minutes more than Colorado’s Semyon Varlamov. It is almost unfair that his goals against
average of 2.80 is 36th in that group of 38 goalies. His .916 save percentage is rather
respectable. He has had a hard time of
it lately, though. In his last seven
appearances he is 3-3-0, 3.35, .901, and he has faced 33.9 shots per 60
minutes. He does have a shutout among
those games, though, his fourth of the season.
Only once, in the 2009-2010 season with Colorado, did he have more
shutouts (seven). In 18 career
appearances against Washington, Anderson is 11-6-1, 2.27, .928, with two
shutouts.
Washington: Andre Burakovsky
Over his last 14 games, Andre Burakovsky has points in nine
of them (4-5-9), and while the point totals do not seem like a lot, he has done
it with ice times under 15 minutes in 12 of those games. And, until he came up a minus-3 against
Pittsburgh on Sunday night, he was a “minus” player in just one of his previous
13 games. He has been a very efficient
shooter this season, converting 15.7 percent of his shots on goal (16 of 102),
best on the club among the 20 skaters having appeared in at least 20 games for
the Caps. He is one of just 19 players
over the past two seasons to have appeared in at least 100 games and recorded a
shooting percentage of 15.0 percent or better.
In three career games against Ottawa, Burakovsky is 0-2-2, plus-2.
In the end…
When you think the Caps are putting things back together,
like they did with consecutive wins over Pittsburgh and Toronto, they lose a
game they had a chance to win against the Rangers. Or when they win consecutive games against
Boston and Anaheim in extra time, they drop a pair – one of them in overtime –
on their California trip. Or when they
win consecutive games against Carolina and Nashville, then they get blown out
by Pittsburgh. It is not a team that is
stringing together a week’s worth of solid performances at a time the way they
were earlier in the season. The Caps
have 11 games to get their affairs in order before the games have higher
stakes.
Capitals 4 – Senators 2
(programming note...we will be off for a few days, but there is a lot of information out there from a lot of great Caps' sites. See you on the weekend).
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