The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!
Hey, didn’t we just do this?
Why yes…yes we have. The
Washington Capitals, who knocked off the Buffalo Sabres in a 4-3 Gimmick win
last Saturday at Capital One Arena, get a chance to make it two-for-two on the
same ice sheet when the Sabres visit on Friday.
While the Caps will be trying to avoid things like allowing two power
play goals and coughing up a lead before coming back to scratch out the win,
as they did in last Friday's win, the Sabres will be looking for their fourth win in six games (3-1-1 in their
last five contests going into this game).
Buffalo has had some difficulty scoring recently. After averaging 3.09 goals per game over their
first 22 games, they backed off by almost a third of a goal per game, to an
average of 2.77 goals per game in their last 13 contests. One Sabre who has not taken his foot off the
gas on offense is Jeff Skinner. With 25
goals through 35 games, he seems a sure bet to record his fourth 30-plus goal
season and demolish his career best of 37 goals in 2016-2017. This is a player who started relatively
slowly, recording only one goal in his first seven games this season. He put that slump to rest with a hat trick
against the Los Angeles Kings in a 5-1 win on October 20th. Starting with that game he has only once gone
as many as three games without a goal, and on only one other occasion did he go
consecutive games without one. He goes
into Friday’s game with goals in four of his last five games (five goals in
all) and on a seven-game points streak (5-4-9).
If anything, he has been more dangerous as a goal scorer on the road
with 14 goals in 18 road contests.
Skinner has dressed for more games against the Caps, most of them with
the Carolina Hurricanes, than he has against any other NHL club over his career. He is 12-13-25, minus-2, in 38 games against
Washington.
One might look at Jack Eichel as the consolation prize in
the Connor McDavid sweepstakes that was the 2015 entry draft. Some “consolation” prize. Eichel is now in his fourth season with the
Sabres, who took him with the second overall pick in that 2015 draft, and he
has slowly and steadily improved on his numbers. A 56-point season in his rookie year was the
foundation for growing into a near point per game player in his next two
seasons. This year, he has 46 points in
35 games, his 1.31 points per game ranking ninth in the league and his 32
assists tied for fifth. He has been
absolutely on fire of late. After going
consecutive games without a point in mid-November, Eichel is 10-17-27, plus-11,
in 17 games. Over that span he was held
without a point only twice while posting ten multi-point games, including a
two-goal effort against the Caps last week.
Add to that the fact that Eichel is 5-22-27, plus-7, in 18 road games,
and he bears watching. In seven career
games against the Caps, he is 2-3-5, minus-2.
All good things come to an end. That might be a phrase to use gently around
Sabres goalie Carter Hutton. Hutton
cobbled together an eight-game winning streak from November 8th
through November 27th, over which he posted a goals against average
of 1.97 and a save percentage of .936.
That streak ended with a 5-4 loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning on November
29th and started Hutton down a different path. In his last five appearances he is 1-3-1,
2.99, ,907, including the trick shot loss to the Caps last week. Hutton has not had a lot of success on the
road so far this season, posting a win-loss record of 4-6-1, along with a GAA
of 2.81 and a save percentage of .909, despite seeing less rubber (30.7 shots
per 60 minutes versus 32.2 shots per 60 minutes at home). Hutton is 2-2-2, 3.53, .876 in seven career
appearances against the Caps.
1. No team in the Eastern
Conference has enjoyed as many power play opportunities on the road as Buffalo
(60, three more than the Florida Panthers).
2. The Sabres could
stand to be a little tighter with the puck on the road. Their 167 charged giveaways are
fourth-highest in the league.
3. Buffalo does not
do a very good job tilting the ice in their favor on the road. They 46.95 shot attempts-for percentage at
5-on-5 is 25th in the league.
4. On the other hand,
the Sabres do have fine 5-on-5 shooting and save percentages on the road, the
sum of which (1014) is fifth-best in the league.
5. Buffalo has 19
skaters who have dressed for at least 10 games on the road. All of them have at least one point.
1. The Caps have won
six straight games against Buffalo at Capital One Arena, outscoring the Sabres
by a 25-10 margin.
2. Last Friday’s game
was the first time that the Caps allowed more than two goals to the Sabres
since they took a 5-3 decision against Buffalo in DC on St. Patrick’s Day 2013,
a span of seven games without doing so.
3. Washington has
pelted the Sabres’ net when hosting them.
The Caps have recorded seven straight games of more than 30 shots on
goal against the Sabres in Washington, averaging 38.7 shots per game.
4. When the Caps
failed to record a power play goal against Pittsburgh on Wednesday, it marked
the first time this season that the Caps failed to record a power play goal in
consecutive home games. Before going
0-for-2, the Caps were shutout on the power play only twice in 15 games at
Capital One Arena.
5. The Caps won only
22 faceoffs (in 56 tries – 39.3 percent).
That was the lowest number of faceoff wins on home ice for the Caps
since Opening Night, when they won only 19 of 60 draws against the Boston
Bruins.
The Peerless’ Players to Ponder
Buffalo: Rasmus Dahlin
Last April, Craig Button called amateur prospect defenseman Rasmus Dahlin a “franchise defining blueliner who very well may be the best
defenceman entering the draft since Denis Potvin in 1973.”
He has done nothing so far to dispel that point of view. Dahlin’s 19 points lead all rookie
defensemen, reminiscent of Potvin’s leading all rookie defensemen in points in
his 1973-1974 rookie season (54 points, well clear of Borje Salming’s 39
points). He did suffer a seven-game
streak without a point when he came to Washington last week, but he broke out
of that slump in a big way by having a hand in all three Sabres goals in the
4-3 loss to the Caps (a goal and two assists).
He followed that up with a two-assist night against the Bruins the next
night in a 4-2 win. Last week’s
three-point night against the Caps was Dahlin’s first appearance against
Washington.
Washington: Tom Wilson
He was suspended for 16 games to open the season, and he
went 8-6-14, plus-8, in 11 games before he was concussed against the Vegas
Golden Knights. He missed three games,
and they he came back and recorded a goal and an assist in three games, not to
mention mixing it up (briefly) with Pittsburgh’s Jamie Oleksiak in the Caps
last game. Tom Wilson is no longer
merely a bludgeon, a cruise missile seeking out opponents to target and destroy
with a big hit or fisticuffs. He’s a
hockey player, a power forward in the traditional sense of the term, a player
who can defend himself or teammates, who can create space for himself and
others to work, who can go into the hard areas and be successful, but most of
all, he can produce. In just 14 games
this season he is already more than half way (nine) to his career best goal
total (14, last season) and is almost half way (16) to his career high in
points (35, also last season). Wilson
has points in 11 of those 14 games in which he played, and the Caps are 9-2-0
in those contests. He is now a player
who makes a difference in a lot of ways.
Nevertheless, he is looking for his first career goal against
Buffalo. He has two assists in 16 games
and is a plus-1 against the Sabres.
In the end…
Familiarity, it is said, breeds contempt. These teams met just a short time ago, so
there is still a reading on the contempt meter that might make this an
interesting game, especially since the Caps are coming off a tough loss to
Pittsburgh on Wednesday. Buffalo, on the
other hand, wants to re-establish some momentum in what has been a pleasantly
surprising season so far. If familiarity
breeds contempt, we’ll go with the outcome being a familiar one.
Capitals 4 – Sabres 2
