The Washington Capitals wrap up the March portion of their
schedule looking to extend their winning streak to what would be a season-long
six games when they host the Carolina Hurricanes on Friday night at Capital One
Arena. With ten wins in March and a
10-3-0 record, the Caps have already tied their highest monthly win total of
the season, having gone 10-2-2 in December.
On the other side, the Hurricanes are hanging on to hope by
the most slender of threads. As of
Thursday morning they trail the New Jersey Devils for the second wild card spot
by nine points with ten points still available (five games) on their
schedule. Since the Devils play the
Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday night, the ‘Canes might be eliminated by the
time the puck drops on 7th Street on Friday.
If Carolina is eliminated, they have the 2018 portion of the
schedule to blame. They completed the
2017 portion of their schedule with an 18-13-7 record, one point behind the New
York Islanders for the second wild card spot.
Since then, however, Carolina is 16-19-4, the tenth-best record in the
Eastern Conference since January 1st.
But there is some cause for hope, if only for the two players
who lead the team in goal scoring in the new year. Sebastian Aho, a 21-year old with 27 goals in
his sophomore NHL season, has already surpassed the 24 goals he had last season
for Carolina as a rookie. Of that total,
16 of them have been scored in 35 games since January 1st. He has ramped up the pace of his goal scoring
as a product of more efficient shooting.
He is one of 11 players in the league who, among players with at least
25 shots on goal, has a shooting percentage better than 20 percent
(16-for-78/20.5 percent). Five of those
16 goals since January 1st were on power plays, the highest total on
the team in that span. Looking back on
his entire season to date, he has been quite consistent on a month-to-month
basis. From November through the March
schedule to date, Aho has recorded either five or six goals in each month (this
after going without one in ten games in October). The problem he has, which is not so much his
as the problem with a young team without enough developed assets, is that his
goal scoring doesn’t yet matter quite enough.
Carolina is just 14-8-2 in the 24 games in which he scored a goal this
season. He is 4-6-10, minus-1, in seven career
games against Washington.
Teuvo Teravainen. only 23 years old, is right behind Aho in
goal scoring in the new year with 14 in 39 games. The production propelled him to the highest
goal total of his five-year career (23), extending his uninterrupted year-to-year progress
in raising his goal-scoring totals (none in three games in his rookie season,
followed by four in 34 games, 13 in 78 games, 15 in 81 games, and the 23 in 77
games this season). He weathered a dry
spell in which he had just two goals over a 19-game span from early-January to
mid-February (he did have 11 assists) only to follow that up with ten goals in
his last 18 games, even though he averaged just 16:39 in ice time over that stretch. There is a distinct difference in his home
and road performances this season, though.
At its root, there is a marked difference between home and road in his
getting shots to the net. He has 103
shots on goal in 39 home games, but he has only 71 shots on goal in 38 road
games. It explains, for the most part
his having 14 of his 23 goals this season scored on home ice and only nine when
away from his home rink, but it is not unusual in that over his career, Teravainen
has 309 shots on goal in 137 home games and 240 shots on goal in 136 road
contests. He is 3-5-8, even, in nine
career games against the Caps.
Carolina is very green on the blue line. Of the six defensemen to appear in at least
50 games this season, four of them are under the age of 25. Trevor van Riemsdyk is the oldest at age
26. None is younger than Noah Hanifin, who
turned 21 in January. The fifth-overall
pick of the 2015 entry draft jumped right to the big club on Opening Night of
the 2015-2016 season and has been a fixture ever since. No Hurricane defenseman has appeared in more
games over the past three seasons than Hanifin (234), and although he would not
be considered an unusually productive “offensive” defenseman (second in goals
and third in points among that group over the last three seasons), he has four
game-winning goals in that span, second only to Justin Faulk (eight) among
defensemen, and he has 25 power play points, second only to Faulk (49). This season, Hanafin appears to be coming out
as a bigger offensive producer. He leads
all Carolina defensemen in goals (10) and points (31), and he has done it while
averaging fewer minutes per game (18:48) than Faulk (22:15), Jaccob Slavin
(22:31), or Brett Pesce (20:54). The
trouble is, though, Carolina is only 9-9-1 when he recorded a point. Hanifin does not have a point against the
Caps in 11 career games played against them, and he is a minus-4.
1. A loss in this
game for Carolina (or if the Devils beat Pittsburgh on Thursday night) would
cement their ninth consecutive season without reaching the postseason, the
longest dry spell in the history of the franchise dating back to when they were
the Hartford Whalers.
2. The Hurricanes
might be the team to points to when arguing “faceoffs don’t matter.” They have won a league-best 53.9 percent of
draws taken.
3. No team has been
penalized less (6:13 minutes per game) or fewer times (216 penalties called)
than Carolina. They are the only team in
the league having been charged with fewer than 200 minor penalties (199).
4. If faceoffs don’t
matter, than what are you going to say about shot attempts? Carolina leads the league in shot
attempts-for percentage at 5-on-5 (54.32).
They are third when ahead (51.39), second when behind (57.29), first
when tied (54.19), and first in close situations (55.09, all numbers from
NHL.com). Small wonder that Carolina enjoys
the best positive overall shot-differential in the league at plus-5.1 shots per
game.
5. On the other hand,
the Hurricanes’ special teams need work, both of them being in the bottom half
of the league. They are 20th
in power play (19.0 percent) and 25th in penalty killing (77.3
percent), one of seven teams with a power play under 20 percent and a penalty
kill under 80 percent).
1. Don’t count on
this game going to a Gimmick. Washington
and Carolina are the only teams in the NHL not to have gone to the freestyle
competition since January 1st.
The last time the Caps did it was December 28th (a 4-3 win
over Boston that, curiously, was the second of a back-to-back set of games that
ended in a Gimmick; the Caps lost to the New York Rangers, 1-0, the previous
night), and the last time Carolina did it was December 12th (a 3-2
win over Vegas).
2. The Caps have a
very efficient power play in one respect.
They score one power play goal for each 7:09 of power play ice time they
get. That is fifth-best in the league
(Tampa Bay is best at one goal per 6:32).
3. Colorado (49.6
percent), Arizona (47.9 percent), and Columbus (47.5 percent) are the only
teams other than the Caps with a power play faceoff winning percentage under 50
percent. The Caps are at 49.4 percent). Contrast that with the Caps and defensive
zone faceoffs, where they are second-best in the league at 54.5 percent
(Carolina, who seems to be at or near the top of all these sorts of lists, are
at 54.7 percent). Perhaps “The Beagle
Effect.”
4. Whatever you think
of the arbitrariness of giveaways and takeaways, here is a club you don’t want
to be in. Montreal, the New York
Islanders, Detroit, and the Caps. These
four teams are the only ones in the league charged with more than 800 giveaways
and credited with fewer than 600 takeaways.
5. What is it with
the Caps and playing 4-on-4? Last year,
they were one of two teams not to score a 4-on-4 goal all season (Carolina was
the other…go figure). This year, they
have two. Only five teams have fewer.
The Peerless’ Players to Ponder
Carolina: Jeff Skinner
Remember when Jeff Skinner was that fresh-faced,
seventh-overall draft pick of the Hurricanes back in 2010? Well, now he has played more games (574) than
all but seven players in franchise history.
He is one of five players to reach the 200-goal mark in club history (he
has 203). He is 14th in
assists (174) and tied with Blaine Stoughton for seventh place in points (377)
for the franchise. There are also a
couple of odd facts attached to his history with the club. He one of only three players in franchise
history with at least 45 power play goals scored for the club, but no
shorthanded goals (Sylvain Turgeon and Ray Ferraro are the others). And, he tied for having the third-worst
plus-minus in the history of the club (minus-93, with Ray Neufeld).
After posting a career best 37 goals last season, he has
fallen off that pace with only 23 so far this season, which is what happens when
you follow a season of having more than 13 percent of your shots find the back
of the net (13.2) with one in which less than nine percent of your shots light
the lamp (8.7). He started well this
season with nine goals in his first 16 games, but he fell off that pace rapidly
thereafter and has only 14 goals in his last 61 games (a 19-goal pace over 82
games). But, as it seems with a number
of other Hurricane skaters, the goal scoring isn’t accompanied by wins. In the 20 games in which Skinner has goals
this season, Carolina is just 9-6-5.
Skinner is 12-12-24, minus-1, in 36 career games against the Capitals.
Washington: Tom Wilson
Don’t bother holding the vote. Tom Wilson is the most improved player on
this team. There isn’t really even a
second place to be had in that race. Wilson
has almost doubled his previous best in goal scoring (from seven, twice, to 13
this season), has a career best in assists (20), a career best in points (33),
a career best in plus-minus (plus-10), a career best in shooting percentage
(11.6), a career high in shots on goal (112) and shot attempts (216), a career
high in blocked shots (49), and a career high in ice time (15:56). If you think of an Alex Ovechkin/Evgeny
Kuznetsov/Tom Wilson top line as a bloody mary cocktail, Ovechkin is the “vodka”
to give it spirit, Kuznetsov is the “celery stick” to blend it, and Wilson is
the horseradish and Tabasco sauce to give it a spicy kick.
His contributions matter. The Caps are 8-1-0 in games this season when
he scored a goal, 19-4-2 in the 25 games in which he registered a point. And he has not been a liability with more ice
time. Washington is 10-2-2 in the 14
games in which he logged more than 18 minutes of ice time. His emergence as a force for good within the
rules has not reduced his propensity for taking penalties. He is second in the league with 183 penalty
minutes, having drawn penalties in 36 of 73 games played this season (he had
penalties in 32 of 82 games last season).
But among 351 forwards skating at least 500 5-on-5 minutes this season,
Wilson ranks third in penalties drawn overall (87) and 12th in
penalties drawn per 60 minutes (5.26; numbers from Corsica.hockey). Wilson has some catching up to do against
Carolina. He is 0-1-1, minus-8, in 20
career games against the Hurricanes.
In the end…
See that long thin pedal on the right? That’s the gas…keep your foot on it. The Caps, barring a total collapse, are
almost certainly going to win the Metropolitan Division and play the first wild
card to open the postseason (as of Thursday afternoon, that team would be the
Columbus Blue Jackets). In fact, a win
over Carolina (should New Jersey beat Pittsburgh on Thursday night) would
clinch the division for the Caps before they face the Hurricanes. But the point is
that this is no time to cut corners, take shortcuts, or coast into the
playoffs. Winning is always the object
of the exercise, but doing things the right way, consistently and reliably, is
what allows winning to take care of itself.
Facing a weaker opponent with little to play for tests that kind of
discipline. Taking care of business,
from puck drop to final horn…that will be what to look for from this team on
Friday night.
Capitals 5 – Hurricanes 2
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