Washington Capitals: That Was The Week That Was -- Week 22

Week 22 was a cold splash of reality for the Washington Capitals as they took their annual trip to the west coast. They found out that in an 82 game season, no team is immune from an off week, even a team threatening to lap the field in the standings.

Record: 1-1-1

If you are going to put a bow on Week 22, it was just the third non-winning week (by standings points) for the Caps this season, and one of the others was a one-game week shortened by a game that was postponed due to Winter Storm Jonas in Week 16.  The week was spent entirely in the Pacific time zone, the Caps taking their annual California spin.  While we do not wish they all could be California games, the Caps having a history of struggles in the Golden State, this was the third consecutive season in which they did not post a losing record on their three-game sojourn.

If you are not inclined to dress this week up in a bow, then you realize that the Caps are now 5-4-1 in their last ten games.  As of Sunday morning, this is the 12^th-best ten-game record in the league (tied with Chicago, another team with Stanley Cup designs, so there is that).  Then there is the record against their cohort – playoff-eligible teams.  In their last 11 contests against teams currently eligible for the postseason, the Caps are 6-4-1.

Offense:  2.00/game (season: 3.16 /game; rank: 2nd)

Hitters go through slumps in baseball, shooters go through slumps in basketball, quarterbacks go through spells when they couldn’t hit the ocean from a boat with a pass.  So it is with hockey players.  There are times when the puck just doesn’t find its way to the back of the net.  So it was in Week 22 for Washington, which managed just six goals on 89 shots on goal for the week.  A 6.7 percent shooting week from a team with the likes of team goal-scoring leader Alex Ovechkin (no goals on 11 shots), second-ranked goal scorer (coming into Week 22) Evgeny Kuznetsov (no goals on seven shots), and Marcus Johansson (no goals on five shots; we will get to him in a moment) is unusual.  But better the slumps be dispatched now than having to deal with them a month from now.

Johansson is a bit of an odd case in Week 22.  All five of his shots on goal for the week came in the middle game, the 4-3 overtime loss to the Los Angeles Kings.  It was his second-highest shot total for the season, matching his five-shot effort (also with no goals) against Colorado on November 21^st and exceeded by a seven-shot game against Buffalo on December 30^th.  Johansson finished the week with no shots on goal in three of his last four games, and he had just nine shot attempts in more than 46 minutes of ice time, including those five shots on goal against Los Angeles.

Defense: 3.33/game (season: 2.34 /game; rank: 3rd)

Slow starts in Week 22 manifested themselves in high shot volumes in the first period.  The Caps were outshot overall by a 34-23 margin in the first 20 minutes of games, and this reflected the underlying possession numbers as well.  In the three first periods of the week, the Caps were out-attempted at 5-on-5 by a 50-38 margin (43.2 percent Corsi-for).  The Caps did do better in the final 40 minutes of games, allowing 23 shots in the second periods of the contests and 24 in the third periods, but they found themselves too often, as has been the case too often over the last month, letting teams dominate early in games.

The odd part of Week 21 with respect to those possession numbers is that over the three games, the total number of Corsi events per 60 minutes varied in a small range – 107.0 to 108.3, a little more than one shot attempt per 60 minutes across the three games.  The Caps were dominated in the split of those relatively equal numbers in two of the games, 61.7 to 46.6 attempts per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 against Anaheim and 58.9 to 49.3 against San Jose.  They did much better in the middle game of the week, 60.5 to 46.5 against the Kings, the top possession team in the league (numbers from war-on-ice.com).

Goaltending: 2.90 /.894 (season: 2.22 / .922 / 2 shutouts)

Week 22 was not a good week overall for the goaltenders.  Usually, when there has been an off week, it was a case of Braden Holtby having a hiccup, but backup Philipp Grubauer doing well in relief.  This week, both netminders struggled to an extent.  Braden Holtby was 1-0-1 for the week, with a 2.34 goals against average and a .913 save percentage.  Philipp Grubauer finally had an off night afteralmost three months of solid play as a backup to or in relief of Holtby.  The four goals he allowed on 27 shots against San Jose in the last game of the week was the first time he allowed more than three goals in a contest since he allowed four goals on 18 shots against Florida on February 2^nd and just the second time he did so since allowing four goals on 23 shots in his first appearance of the season back on October 23^rd against Edmonton.

Holtby is more of a concern than Grubauer, though.  In his last 20 appearances he has a fine win-loss record of 13-4-2.  However, he has a goals against average of 2.89 and a save percentage of .901.  That save percentage is of particular concern.  Think of it this way.  There are 37 goalies this season to have logged more than 1,500 minutes of ice time.  Only one – Toronto’s Jonathan Bernier – has a save percentage lower than .901.

Power Play: 2-for-8 / 25.0 percent (season: 23.8 percent; rank: 2nd)

There was nothing particularly wrong with the power play in Week 22, but it came up short at the wrong times, specifically in the last game of the week in San Jose.  Overall, the Caps scored power play goals in two of the three games of the week (including that game in San Jose), extending a run in which they scored a power play to seven times in nine games (8-for-26/30.8 percent).

The Caps were efficient enough, recording two goals on 12 total power play shots on goal in 11:55 of power play ice time.  But there was an unevenness to it, too.  T.J. Oshie scored the only power play goals of the week on three total shots.  Alex Ovechkin was blanked on four shots on goal, and four other Caps came up empty on single shots apiece.

That game against San Jose was one that left a bad taste in one’s mouth with respect to the power play.  The Caps did score a 5-on-3 goal, their third 5-on-3 goal of the season.  However, they did not convert the ensuing 5-on-4, and they allowed a shorthanded goal on another power play.  Those were the momentum killers that kept the Caps from climbing all the way out of the holes they kept digging by falling behind the Sharks, and it helped send them to their only regulation loss of the week.

Penalty Killing: 7-for-9 / 75.0 percent (season: 84.2 percent; rank: 4th)

The Caps finished Week 22 under 80 percent on the penalty kill for the first time since Week 17 and for just the fourth time this season.  They allowed power play goals in the last two games of the week.  Not coincidentally, they came in losses.  In fact, the Caps have now lost the last four games in which they allowed a power play goal (0-3-1).

It was an efficient week for the penalty killers, who allowed opponents just nine shots on goal in 15:25 of shorthanded ice time.  And in neither instance of an opponent goal could it be a called a case of defensive breakdowns.  Against Los Angeles, an Alec Martinez shot hit a stick and two skates before finding the back of the net, and against San Jose it was more a case of goalie Philipp Grubauer misplaying a Joe Pavelski shot into a goal than a breakdown in front of him.  The penalty killers probably deserved a better fate than a 75 percent week.

Faceoffs: 72-for-175 / 41.1 percent (season: 49.5% / rank: 20th)

Woof!  The Caps were awful in the circle for the week.  They were below 50 percent in all three games, they were below 50 percent in all three zones, and no Capital taking ten or more draws finished the week above 50 percent.  The best they could manage in any game was 43.9 percent against the Kings.  The best they could manage in any zone was 45.5 percent in the offensive zone.  And, Nicklas Backstrom was the best the Caps could do among players with ten or more draws taken, finishing the week 23-for-54 (42.6 percent).  It was a grim week in this area of the game.

Goals by Period:

About those slow starts… recording no goals in any first period and allowing five goals to opponents made for a difficult week, always having to climb out of a hole.  Washington allowed at least one goal in the first period in each game of the week, part of a skid in which they have allowed the first goal of the game 13 times in 15 games and getting outscored in the first period by a combined 17-4 margin.

That the Caps eked out close positive differentials in the second and third periods did little to make up for the slow starts, but at least they continue to be dominant in those periods, finishing the week with goal differentials of plus-28 in the second period and plus-33 in the third period for the season.  The fact that they are a minus-6 in the first period is something that jumps out from the score sheet, though, and is perhaps the most important thing to be addressed as the Caps head into the final stages of the regular season.

In the end…

The Capitals are not the dominating team that they were over the first 50-60 games of the season.  Their last ten games have been plagued by slow starts and uneven goaltending.  Important players are in a bit of a rut – Alex Ovechkin and Braden Holtby being the noteworthy culprits here.  But they are hardly alone.  The third line of Marcus Johansson, Tom Wilson, and Jason Chimera had one point for the week, and that was a power play assist by Johansson.  That group has not had a goal since Wilson had one against Pittsburgh on March 1^st.  It is not a team that is firing on all cylinders lately.  One can wave this away with the thought that perhaps everyone is getting this out of their systems at the same time, and better now than in April.  But it will make next week one to watch with a measure of concern as the Caps have an opportunity to turn things around with a pair of home games.  The team with the league’s best home record (26-6-2) needs to take advantage of the schedule to get back on track.

Three Stars:

• First Star: T.J. Oshie (2-1-3, minus-2, 2 PPG, 9 shots on goal, 4 hits)
• Second Star: Nicklas Backstrom (1-1-2, minus-1, GW shootout goal, 7 shots on goal
• Third Star: Evgeny Kuznetsov (0-3-3, even, 7 shots on goal)