And now, for something completely different. No, not the second round series against the
Pittsburgh Penguins that starts on Thursday.
The Washington Capitals, heavily favored but given all they could handle
by the upstart Toronto Maple Leafs, overcame a fair amount of adversity in Game
6 – a roaring Toronto crowd, a misaligned stanchion, another in what seems over
the course of their history a series of “hot goaltenders – to tie the game in
the last half of the third period, then score in the seventh minute of the
first overtime to capture their first round series in six games over the Maple
Leafs.
It was a tense evening for the cousins as the Caps once more
tested the limits of their ability to stay calm and think good thoughts. But let’s let them wrap things up…
Fearless… If you were playing the overtime goal challenge,
you might have picked a half-dozen players as the potential hero before
settling on Marcus Johansson, and that’s just among the Caps’ players. Going into last night’s game, Johansson had
seven goals in 61 career playoff games.
He had never scored more than two goals in any postseason. It broke a nine-game streak without a
postseason goal, dating back to Game 2 of last spring’s series against
Pittsburgh. He scored on each of his
only two shots of the contest last night.
Oddly enough, it was the second time in his career that Johansson scored
two goals in a playoff game, and both instances came on the road. The other instance was in Game 4 of the Caps’
2011 series against the New York Rangers, a game in which Johansson scored two
third period goals that, following a goal by Alexander Semin earlier in that
period, wiped out a 3-0 Rangers lead before Jason Chimera won the game in
double-overtime.
Cheerless… The Caps had the fifth-worst scoring defense in the
first round (2.67 goals against per game).
They four teams under them in the rankings? ...gone. And they won a grand total of three games
among them (Toronto had two of them).
Only two team allowed more shots on goal per game than the Caps
(35.5). Strangely enough, both of them
are alive – Pittsburgh (38.8) and St. Louis (36.4). And their faceoff winning percentage…woof! They are 15th of 16 teams in the
playoffs at 46.0 percent. Hey, draws don’t
matter, right? Well one, it’s attention
to detail, and two…why would you dismiss possessing the puck for 10 or 15
seconds with every draw you win? Put a
team on their heels, forcing them to defend more often than not from a faceoff,
might have a cumulative effect, eh?
*****
Feerless… Caps had the fourth-best special teams index
(power play plus penalty killing rates) in the first round (118.5)…
Cheerless… The three teams ahead of them – Minnesota (129.7),
Montreal (127.6), and Chicago (119.0) – are out. And only Boston had more minor penalties in
the first round (26) than the Caps (25).
*****
Cheerless… How close was this series? The Caps outscored Toronto 18-16. Washington was outshot, 213-211. The Caps had 25 penalties, Toronto had 24. The Maple Leafs were credited with 256 hits,
the Caps had 241. Washington had the
advantage in blocked shots, 127-116. And
that was against the eight-seed. Did the
Caps play down to Toronto’s level, or did the Leafs play up to the Caps’ level?
Fearless… The Caps scored more first period goals in the
first round than any team (eight) and tied Ottawa for the most goals in
overtime (three). Only Nashville (one)
and Anaheim (none) allowed fewer third period goals than the Caps (three).
*****
Fearless… Washington had have the fifth-best Corsi-for at
5-on-5 in the postseason so far (51.30 percent).
Cheerless… They were seventh in adjusted Corsi (50.42
percent; numbers from Corsica.hockey), and they had the second-worst adjusted
Corsi Against/60 minutes (66.26). Only
Toronto was worse (67.39).
*****
Cheerless… The Caps kinda dodged a bullet getting as little
output from Andre Burakovsky (two assists) even while he had pretty good
possession numbers (best individual Corsi-for on the club at 5-on-5: 59.69
percent). And one of the problems the
Caps had last spring – a lack of bottom-six production – showed up in this
series. The five forwards not named “Wilson”
finished with no goals and four assists.
The fourth line that finished the series (Brett Connolly for Tom Wilson)
didn’t have a point in the series.
Fearless… At the other end, the top-six did their
share. The top line of Alex Ovechkin,
Nicklas Backstrom, and T.J. Oshie accounted for eight goals, three of them on
the power play. The second line of
Marcus Johansson, Evgeny Kuznetsov, and Justin Williams accounted for six
goals. And every defenseman, save for
Karl Alzner, who was limited to two games due to injury, recorded at least one
point.
*****
Peerless… The knee-jerk reaction to a series like the one
just ended would be to say that the Caps underachieved. That does not give due credit to the Maple
Leafs for the strides they took this season, especially over the last six weeks
of the regular season in which their record and that of the Caps were virtually
identical.
In its own perverse way, Toronto might have been the best
team for the Caps to face in the first round, even if things ended up closer
than anyone might have expected, or wanted, for that matter. Toronto’s strength at forward and team speed
is as close an approximation as one is going to find in the East to what awaits
the Caps in the second round against Pittsburgh. If anything, the Penguins’ defense might be
more vulnerable to exploitation, but the experience, not to mention the skill
among their forwards will be formidable.
But for now, let’s just be thankful for a first round win. And for Caps fans who might say, “so what, it’s
just the first round,” remember… you can’t win four if you don’t win one.
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