The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!
Having gotten 2017 off to a good start with a New Year's Day win, the Washington
Capitals look to double their pleasure and double their fun in the young new
year when they host the Toronto Maple Leafs on Tuesday night at Verizon Center.
The Caps find themselves in the midst of a regular rhythm in
their schedule, playing every other date starting with the New Year’s Day win
over the Ottawa Senators and lasting until January 16th, when the
Caps will face the Pittsburgh Penguins in the back half of a back-to-back set
of games. As for the Maple Leafs, they
will be coming off a wild and entertaining 5-4 overtime win over the Detroit
Red Wings outdoors in the Centennial Classic at Exhibition Stadium in Toronto.
This will be the second of three regular season meetings
between the clubs this season, the Caps dropping the first of them, a 4-2 loss
in Toronto on November 26th.
Since then, the Caps are 9-3-3, while the Leafs are 8-4-3. Despite the winning records, neither team has
made much headway in the standings since that first meeting. After that game on November 26th,
Washington was third in the Metropolitan Division and fourth in the Eastern Conference. On Tuesday, the Caps were fourth in the Metro
and fifth in the conference. Meanwhile,
the Maple Leafs were fifth in the Atlantic Division and tenth in the Eastern
Conference, precisely where they found themselves on Tuesday.
Toronto is led these days by a precocious trio of rookies
who ranked first, third, and fourth among rookies in total scoring after the
New Year’s Day games. Foremost among
them is the top overall draft pick of last June’s entry draft, Auston
Matthews. He leads all rookies with 20
goals and with 32 points through 36 games.
He exploded on the NHL scene with a four-goal game in his first
professional game, a 5-4 overtime loss to the Ottawa Senators on October 12th. He had six goals in his first six games, but
then went into a slump that had him without a goal and with only three assists
over his next 13 games. He came out of
that slump with a two-goal/three-point performance against the New Jersey
Devils in a 5-4 trick shot loss on November 23rd. Starting with that game, Matthews is 14-5-19,
plus-76, over his last 17 games. He had
a goal in his only appearance against the Caps back on November 26th.
Mitch Marner was another top-five draft pick of the Leafs,
taken with the fourth-overall pick in the 2015 entry draft. After completing his third year with the
London Knights in Canadian junior hockey (a season in which he was 39-77-116,
plus-45, in 57 regular season games and 16-28-44 in 18 postseason games), he
stuck with the Maple Leafs to start this season. He has been, to date, more of a player who
puts up points in bunches. He has eight
multi-point games through 36 games so far, one behind Winnipeg’s Patrick Laine
among rookies this season and tied with his rookie teammate, Matthews. He comes into this game in the midst of what
passes for a cool spell for him, 1-0-1 in his last four games. Marner had two assists in the Leafs’ 4-2 win
over Washington on November 26th.
The third rookie in this trio is William Nylander, son of
two-time former Capital Michael Nylander.
Taken as the eighth-overall pick in the 2014 entry draft, Nylander
played a second season with MODO Hockey in Sweden, then joined the Toronto
Marlies in the AHL to wrap up the 2014-2015 season. He was 14-18-32 in just 37 games in his
abbreviated season with the Marlies, then split time the following season
between the Marlies (18-27-45 in 38 games) and the Maple Leafs (6-7-13 in 22
games). Nylander has been a picture of
consistency, especially for a rookie, his longest streak without a point this
season just three games. He comes into
this contest with points in five straight games (2-3-5) and points in eight of
his last 11 contests (2-7-9). He did not
play in the November 26th contest against the Caps, the only game he
has missed this season. He does not have
a point in one career appearance against Washington.
1. Toronto has not had a 40-win season since 2006-2007 (40-31-11). They are currently on a pace to finish this season with 39 wins.
2. Only two rookies in Maple Leaf history have finished their inaugural season with at least 20
goals and at least 60 points.
The three aforementioned rookies all are on or near a pace to reach those
marks. Auston Matthews is on a pace to
finish 46-27-73, Mitch Marner is on a pace to finish 21-41-62, and William
Nylander is on a pace to finish 19-39-58.
3. The Maple Leafs
have a talent for jumping on teams early; they have a plus-10 goal differential
in the first periods of games this season.
However, as perhaps the young team they are, closing teams out is a bit
of an issue. They have a minus-5 goal
differential in the third periods of games.
4. Toronto is one of
four teams to have dressed eight rookies so far this season (Anaheim, Arizona,
and Boston are the others). No team has
dressed more. Six of the Leafs’ rookies
have appeared in at least 35 games hand all of them have at least 15
points. No other team in the league has
more than two rookies with 15 or more points so far this season (New York
Rangers, Philadelphia Flyers).
5. Toronto has not
quite gotten the hang of possession.
They rank 13th overall in Corsi-for at 5-on-5 (50.39 percent)
and, as the young team they are, they struggle on the road in this area,
ranking 19th away from Air Canada Centre (48.59 percent; numbers from Corsica.hockey).
1. The Caps have a
fine franchise record in New Year’s Day games.
Their win over Ottawa on Sunday gave them a 16-6-1 record (with three
ties) in Janaury 1st games.
The second game of the new year?
Well, that needs work. The Caps
have a 10-11-1 record (with four ties) in their second games of the new year.
2. The Caps will
bring a six-game winning streak on home ice against Toronto into this
game. Over those games the Caps have
outscored the Maple Leafs, 21-9 (not including a trick shot winning goal for
the Caps in January 2015).
3. The loss to the
Maple Leafs in Toronto last November is one of just two regulation losses to
Atlantic Division teams this year for the Caps.
They are 9-2-1 against the Atlantic so far.
4. The Caps have trailed
at the second intermission in 11 games this season. They have won just once. Only Dallas and the New York Islanders have
failed to win in that situation so far this season.
5. No Capital forward
with more than 50 minutes of 5-on-5 ice time so far this season has a Corsi-for
under 50 percent when the score is tied (numbers from Corsica.hockey).
The Peerless’ Players to Ponder
Toronto: Connor Brown
Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, and William Nylander are
among the rookie leaders in scoring so far this season, a fact that is not
entirely surprising, given that all were top-ten draft picks. Connor Brown, however, is an intriguing
fourth member of the Toronto rookie scoring parade. His is a case of hometown boy does good,
despite a disadvantageous draft position.
The Toronto native was taken in the sixth round (156th
overall) in the 2012 entry draft, and he immediately displayed a potential for
scoring, at least in Canadian juniors.
He was 25-28-53 in 68 games with the Erie Otters before being drafted by
the Leafs, then posted seasons of 28-41-69 in 63 games and 45-83-128 in 68
games in years to follow with the Otters.
Brown graduated to the Toronto Marlies of the AHL in
2014-2015 and posted 21 goals and 61 points in 76 games of his rookie pro
season. Last year, he was up for a cup
of coffee with the parent club, getting his first NHL goal in seven games. In 36 games so far this season, Brown is
7-9-16, plus-5, in 36 games, tied for tenth in rookie scoring overall (with
teammate Zach Hyman, among others). He
might be getting the knack for scoring at the NHL level, going 3-4-7, plus-2,
in his last five games.
Washington: Evgeny Kuznetsov
“Dark night of the soul” might be a bit too dramatic to
describe Evgeny Kuznetsov’s current state of play (and with apologies to St.
John of the Cross, who wrote the poem later given that name and that has an
entirely different meaning for “dark night”), but one just wonders what is
going on in Kuznetsov’s game and whether his confidence has been chipped at
over the last six weeks. Kuznetsov does
not have a goal since before Thanksgiving (the night before), a span of 17
games. He does have ten assists in that
span, but he gives the impression of passing up opportunities from good scoring
position in favor of trying to make a pass to a teammate.
Head coach Barry Trotz apparently has taken notice, and
Kuznetsov’s ice time has fallen off the table in his last four games, going
from 19:05 to 16:27 to 14:44 to 13:40 in the New Year’s Day game against
Ottawa. In fact, Kuznetsov skated only
4:10 in the first period of that game and only 4:11 in the second period, not
what one expects from a player who had been getting first line minutes not too
long ago with Alex Ovechkin and T.J. Oshie.
It goes without saying that Kuznetsov has to raise his level of
production a couple of notches if the Caps are going to make a deep push in the
postseason, and perhaps the calendar turning over will give him that new
life. In eight career games against the Maple
Leafs, he is 0-4-4, even.
In the end…
If you look at the Maple Leafs from a certain angle, they
are the Capitals of the first couple of years coming out of the 2004-2005
lockout and the early stages of their 2007-2008 season in which they rode a
late season push to elbow their way into the playoffs. They are Toronto’s version of the Young Guns,
a young, prolific offensive team that sits four points out of a playoff spot
with 46 games to play. That they bring a
five-game winning streak into this game, four of the wins earned on the road,
doesn’t hurt, either. And letting them
run wild on offense is not a prescription for winning.
The Leafs are 11-0-4 in games this season when they score four or more goals, and only Pittsburgh, the Rangers, and Tampa Bay have scored four or more goals more times this season than Toronto. The Caps have allowed four or more goals only five times this season, but a common thread among most of the opponents doing so is speed – Carolina, the Rangers, Edmonton, and the Leafs (who scored four in November against the Caps) have that attribute. This makes this game a singular challenge for the Caps, one in which it will be interesting to note the degree to which Washington can impose its will on the whippersnappers from up north.
The Leafs are 11-0-4 in games this season when they score four or more goals, and only Pittsburgh, the Rangers, and Tampa Bay have scored four or more goals more times this season than Toronto. The Caps have allowed four or more goals only five times this season, but a common thread among most of the opponents doing so is speed – Carolina, the Rangers, Edmonton, and the Leafs (who scored four in November against the Caps) have that attribute. This makes this game a singular challenge for the Caps, one in which it will be interesting to note the degree to which Washington can impose its will on the whippersnappers from up north.
Capitals 4 – Maple Leafs 3