The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!
If it’s Mid-March, it’s time to heed the advice of Horace
Greeley and “go west, young man” if you are a Washington Capital. The Caps head
to the left coast this week for the annual California roll through San Jose,
Anaheim, and Los Angeles. On Thursday night they open the visit by facing off
with the Sharks in San Jose.
Most Caps fans know by now that Washington has not won a
game in regulation in San Jose since October 30, 1993. “Dreamlover” by Mariah
Carey was the top single that week. “The Bridges of Madison County” by Robert
James Waller was the best-selling book in fiction, while “Private Parts” by
Howard Stern topped the non-fiction book list. “The Nightmare Before Christmas”
was the number one movie.
It need not be said that games in San Jose have had a
nightmarish quality for the Caps. Sure, they have won twice there since 1993 (2-12-0 with one tie overall),
both in extra time (a 3-2 Gimmick win in 2014 and a 5-4 overtime win in 2015),
but for the most part, the Caps know the way to San Jose; they just don’t know
how to win once they get there. Their all-time record there is 5-12-0 with one
tie.
As for the Sharks, they are quietly assembling quite a
season. They have the seventh-best record in the league (39-19-7/85 points) and
have won four of their last five games going into this contest with the Caps.
Stinginess on defense has been their calling card lately. Only once in their
last ten games have they allowed more than three goals, and only twice have
they allowed more than two. They allowed just 20 goals in those ten games, six
of them in a 6-5 overtime loss to the Florida Panthers on February 15th.
The stinginess is due in no small part to goaltender Martin
Jones. Only four times in 53 appearances this season has he allowed more than
three goals in a game, and since the last time he did that (he allowed all six
goals in the loss in the 6-5 overtime loss to Florida), he has stopped 106 of
112 shots (.946 save percentage) in compiling a 2-1-1 record over four
games. Since taking on the full time goaltending duties with the Sharks last
season after being traded there by the Boston Bruins (four days after being
traded to Boston by the Los Angeles Kings), Jones has won more games in goal
than any netminder in the league (67, tied with Devan Dubnyk) except for the
Caps’ Braden Holtby (82). And here is your odd Martin Jones fact. No netminder
has played more minutes over the last two seasons than Jones (6,892), and he
has no penalty minutes. The next highest ranked goalie in minutes played with
no penalty minutes over the last two seasons is Tuukka Rask (6th in minutes
played with 6,654). If the Caps score on this guy, they might want to save the
puck. Jones is 3-0-, 0.67, .975, with two shutouts in three career appearances
against Washington.
Moving out from the crease, there is Brent Burns, who is
putting together quite a season of his own, but mostly at the other end of the
ice. Although he has played in just 65 games to date, he has the 14th-highest
point total for a defenseman (67) in the post-2004-2005 lockout period. His 27
goals is the second highest over the period (tied with his own total from last
season), trailing only the 31 goals posted by then-Capital Mike Green in
2008-2009. He is on a pace to finish the season 34-50-84, which would be tops
in goals and points in this era for defensemen. He is without a point in his
last two games, but that comes after a seven-game points streak (5-5-10,
plus-10). In 13 career games against the Caps, Burns is 6-6-12, plus-2.
Joe Thornton has always been much more a set-up guy than a
call-my-own-number goal scorer, but his goal scoring has tumbled dramatically
this season. He has five goals through 65 games, and that 0.08 goals per game
production is his lowest over a season since his rookie year in Boston in
1997-1998 (0.05 on three goals in 55 games). This comes off a 19-goal season,
more than he had in any season since he recorded 21 goals in 2010-2011. What
might be more of a concern, though, is his assists are down. From his rookie
season through last year, Thornton had more assists than anyone, and it wasn’t
close (964 assists to 752 for Jaromir Jagr). With 36 helpers in 65 games so far
this season, Thornton is on a pace to finish with the fewest assists he had in a
full season (45) since he had 25 in 81 games in his first full season with
Boston in 1998-1999. It would be the fewest he ever had in a full season with
the Sharks. He was showing signs of increasing his production, going 2-4-6 over
a five-game stretch last month, but he is 0-2-2 in his last six games, one of those assists being the 1,000th of his career, coming on an empty net goal that would become the game-winner against Winnipeg last Monday. Thornton
is 16-29-45, plus-11, in 42 career games against the Capitals.
1. San Jose just hums
along. Since the start of the new calendar year they are tied for third in
points earned (38, with Chicago) and sixth in fewest goals allowed, but they
are not doing it with special teams. San Jose is just 22nd in power play
conversions (15.8 percent) and 26th on the penalty kill (76.8 percent).
2. Those numbers do
not get any better on home ice. The Sharks have just the ninth best record in
teams of points earned on home ice since January 1st (18, with four other
teams), they are 29th in home power play efficiency (8.3 percent, ahead of only
the 5.9 percent New York Rangers), and their home penalty kill is ranked 26th
(75.8 percent).
3. San Jose is not a
particularly explosive offense. Only three teams have scored five goals in a
game fewer times than the Sharks (5) this season : Arizona (4), New Jersey (4),
and Colorado (3).
4. On the other hand,
only two teams have had more games allowing two or fewer goals than the Sharks
(38): Washington (39) and Columbus (40). And this might be key…San Jose has
lost just once in regulation this season when allowing two or fewer goals
(34-1-3). Pittsburgh is the only team in the league that has not lost a game in
regulation when allowing two or fewer goals (28-0-4).
5. Adjusted for
score, zone, and venue, San Jose is fifth in the league in Corsi-for at 5-on-5
(51.63 percent). They have the second-best Corsi-SV% this season (.965, to
Washington’s .969; numbers from Corsica.hockey).
1. The Caps are one
of three teams with two players having 30 or more points since the start of the
calendar year. Nicklas Backstrom (37, tied for the league lead with Boston’s
Brad Marchand) and Evgeny Kuznetsov (32) have done it for the Caps. Marchand
and Patrice Bergeron (31) did it for Boston; Patrick Kane (33) and Jonathan
Toews (30) have done it for Chicago.
2. Justin Williams
has been a very efficient player. Despite averaging the third lowest amount of
ice time in his career (15:37) and the lowest since the 2001-2002 season with
Philadelphia (14:27), he is having his best shooting season, percentage-wise
(14.4 percent), better than the 12.8 percent he had in 82 games with Carolina
in 2006-2007.
3. Of the top-ten
players in plus-minus since January 1st, the Caps have eight of them (Orpik,
Connolly, Alzner, Orlov, Eller, Kuznetsov, Carlson, Williams). If you count
ties at the bottom of the top ten, the Caps have nine of the top-12 (add in
Matt Niskanen).
4. If you want to
compare defensemen, there are those 27 goals Brent Burns has for San Jose.
“Defensemen,” as in “all of them,” have 20 for the Caps.
5. The Caps are
15-1-0 at home in 2017, but their road record is a lot more pedestrian. They have
18 points since January 1st (tied with Edmonton for seventh-best in the league). Their special
teams are uneven, the power play tied for second with Toronto on the road since
January 1st (28.2 percent), while the penalty kill is tied for 18th with
Pittsburgh (78.0 percent).
The Peerless’ Players to Ponder
San Jose: Marc-Edouard Vlasic
Marc-Edouard Vlasic has put together a nice career with the
San Jose Sharks. The 2005 second round draft pick ranks tenth among active
defensemen in games played since he came into the league in 2006-2007 (797) and
only one of three in the top ten to do it having played for just one team in
their career (Chicago’s Brent Seabrook and Duncan Keith are the others). He has
not been a particularly prolific offensive player (his 247 career points ranks
40th among active defensemen), but with a generally successful Sharks team, his
plus-minus reflects that success (ranked third in that group at plus-127,
behind Keith and Zdeno Chara). His offense this season has been in line with
his career numbers in goals, assists, and points, but his plus-2 is the lowest
he has had since he was minus-12 for the 2007-2008 Sharks. He has one point (an
assist) in his last seven games and is even over that span. In 14 career games
against Washington, Vlasic is 3-3-6, plus-8.
Washington: Kevin Shattenkirk
It has only been four games, and it is only 31 minutes of
5-on-5 ice time, but Kevin Shattenkirk and Brooks Orpik have made a nice pair
at 5-on-5 with a Corsi-for of 55.00 percent, the fourth-best of any defensive
pairing for the Caps with that many 5-on-5 minutes played together (numbers from
Corsica.hockey). On his own he is at 53.51 percent, second only to Matt
Niskanen (54.16 percent) among Caps defensemen. This suggests that he is doing
the fundamental things to contribute to success, even if his early numbers do
not sparkle (0-2-2, minus-2 in four games). Of particular importance to this
game and this week is that Shattenkirk has done quite well against the
California teams, going a combined 8-24-32 in 57 career games against Anaheim,
Los Angeles, and San Jose. He is 5-11-16, even, in 20 career games against the
Sharks. Oh, and pondering Shattenkirk is a chance to ask if Shattenkirk and comic Jay Mohr were
twins separated at birth…
In the end…
The Caps have built a lead in the league standings this
season, but it has not been a product of their performance on the road. It is
not a bad record, mind you, but their 17 wins ranks tied for ninth (with Ottawa
and Boston), and their 40 standings points is tied for seventh (with Calgary, Montreal,
and Boston). Going out to California is never an easy chore for this, or any
other Eastern Conference team, for that matter, but this is a chance to take
stock on just how far this team has come and how much further they have to go
to raise confidence that they can go deep in the postseason. The Caps get what
is probably the most difficult of the three opponents first in terms of the
regrettable history of success (or lack of it) and the quality of the team they
will face. Winning will take being at the top of their game, something we
haven’t seen as much of from the Caps this month as we did last.
Capital 3 – Sharks 2
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