Record: 2-2-0
A four-game week featuring three of the best and/or hottest
teams in the league and the other an old rival who remains desperate to get
back into the playoff conversation would make for a difficult week for any
team, including a division leader such as the Caps. That Washington split the week was not the
worst of outcomes in that context.
Looking back on the week and trying to look ahead, the Caps
beat Winnipeg to earn a split in the season series at a win apiece, each team
winning on home ice. The loss to the
Penguins was, as it always is, hard to swallow, but the significance is that
the Caps lost three of four in the season series to the Pens (1-2-1). The Caps took their third game in a row this
season against the Flyers with one game remaining in the series, that on March
24th in Washington.
Washington wrapped up the week with the first of three meetings against
the Tampa Bay Lightning to be played over a two-week period. The loss to the Bolts gave the Caps a 5-4-1
season record against four playoff or near-playoff quality teams.
The two wins for the week pushed the Caps past the 90-point
mark for the 11th consecutive full season of hockey (not including
the shortened 2012-2013 season). They
remain on a pace to finish this season with more than 100 points, which would
be the fifth straight season topping 100 points.
Offense: 3.50/game (season: 3.39/7th)
It was a good week on paper for the Caps, even if the goal
total was padded a bit by a pair of empty net goals. They all count. The Caps have been remarkably consistent over
the past few weeks. Not only have they
scored at least three goals in 12 of their last 13 games, they have scored
exactly three goals in eight of those games, going 6-2 in them in the process. Both of the losses in three-goal games came
this week against two of the more high-powered offenses in the league in
Pittsburgh and Tampa Bay.
As for the Caps, they spread things around on an individual
basis. Nine players accounted for the 14
goals scored in Week 24, five of them with two apiece: Jakub Vrana, Lars Eller,
Brett Connolly, John Carlson, and Alex Ovechkin.
Ovechkin’s two goals brought him to 655 for his career, one
short of Brendan Shanahan for 13th place on the all-time NHL goal
scoring list. His power play goal in the
6-3 loss to Tampa Bay on Saturday was the 246th of his career, tying
him with Phil Esposito for fifth place on the all-time list and brining him to
within one of Luc Robitaille for fourth place on that list.
Vrana’s two goals and Tom Wilson’s lone goal of the week put
both players in the 20-goal club for the first time in their respective careers
and brought the Caps’ total of 20-plus goal scorers this season to four. Last season, the Caps had only three 20-plus
goal scorers all season (Ovechkin with 49, Evgeny Kuznetsov with 27, and
Nicklas Backstrom with 21). Vrana and Wilson
joined Ovechkin (48) and T.J. Oshie (21) in the 20-goal club this season. Three other players are within striking
distance: Connolly (19), Kuznetsov (18), and Backstrom (18).
Carlson led the team in overall scoring for the week
(2-3-5), while Dmitry Orlov led the club in assists (four). Orlov also had a team-best plus-4 rating for
the week. For Carlson, the five-point
week pushed him past the 60-point mark for the second straight season. He
became the fourth defenseman in Caps history to post consecutive 60-point
seasons. Mike Green was the last to do
it, in the 2008-2009 and 2009-2010 seasons, while Larry Murphy (1985-1986
through 1987-1988) and Scott Stevens (1986-1987 through 1988-1989) each did it
three years in a row.
Defense: 3.50/game (season: 3.11/20th)
The Caps faced four productive offenses in Week 24, and the
results were better than the goals per game would suggest. For instance, they allowed 123 shots in the
four games, an average of 30.8 per game, a number that is below the team’s
average for the season (31.9 shots allowed per game). Further, there were the shot attempts at five
on five. The Caps enjoyed a considerable
advantage in that regard, winning that battle three times in four games,
finishing a week with a plus-33 and a shot attempts-for percentage of 54.81. That shot attempt differential was fourth-best among teams playing four games in Week 24.
Goaltending: 2.80 / .908 (season: 2.93 / .907 / 4 shutouts)
That the goaltending was more or less a typical week overall
is not the best news when looking at the detail, although quality of
competition needs to be considered.
Pheonix Copley got the call to open the week, and he had a very effective
game against the Winnipeg Jets. He
allowed a single goal on 34 shots faced to win his fifth straight
decision. It was the best performance he
had in that five-win run, over which he has a goals against average of 2.92 and
a save percentage of .908.
Braden Holtby got the call in the other three games, and his
results were uneven. He was, for the
most part, very good in his first game of the week, facing the Penguins. That is, except for a span of 1:48 in the
second period during which the Pens scored on three consecutive shots to turn a
2-0 deficit into a 3-0 lead that they would not relinquish. Take that away, and he was 25-for-26. He was consistently solid against the Flyers
in his second game of the week, holding a club that scored 33 goals in its
previous eight games to a pair of goals on 24 shots. Against Tampa Bay he suffered the fate a lot
of goaltenders have this season, giving up four goals on 33 shots (the 40th
time this season a goaltender allowed four or more goals to the
Lightning).
Overall, the netminders finished games better than they
started them. There were 34 saves on 38
first period shots faced (.895 save percentage) and 36 saves on 41 second
period shots faced (.878), influenced by that three-goal surge the Penguins had
in the second game of the week. Third
periods were much better, with 39 saves on 41 shots (.951), although there were
the three empty net goals that do not count against the save percentages.
Power Play: 2-for-11/18.2 percent (season: 21.8 percent/9th)
It was something of an odd week for the Capitals, but
panning out for a wider shot, it might have been simply a reflection of the league
these days. The Caps had a four-game
week, which should have meant a high power play opportunity total, even if the
average of opportunities per game was not.
Eleven chances in four games (2.75 per game) seemed light in that
context. However, the Caps tied for the fifth-highest
number of chances overall and tied for the fourth-highest total among teams
playing four games.
That the Caps converted only two of those chances was
disappointing, considering that three of their opponents in Week 24 ranked
among the bottom 13 teams in the league in penalty killing at week’s end
(Pittsburgh: 19th, Winnipeg: 23rd; and Philadelphia” 26th). The Caps were 1-for-7 against those three
teams. The bright spot was in converting
one of four chances on the road against the best penalty killing team in the
league in Tampa Bay (85.6 percent).
The Caps looked disjointed on the power play at times over
the week and it showed up in the form of inability to get shots to the
net. Washington managed only 12 shots on
goal in 18:27 of man advantage ice time, including getting blanked in shots in
four minutes of power play time against Winnipeg. It was not a problem of getting the puck to
the preferred target. Alex Ovechkin had
nine of the 12 power play shots on goal, converting one of them. Three other players had one apiece: John
Carlson (a goal), Evgeny Kuznetsov, and T.J. Oshie.
Penalty Killing: 15-for-17/88.20 percent (season: 79.8
percent/21st)
The Caps played with fire in this category all week. No team was shorthanded more often in total
or in times per game for Week 24 than Washington. That the Caps allowed only two goals, both of
them to Pittsburgh, was an achievement.
In fact, those are the only power play goals that the Caps have allowed
over their last eight games, going 26-for-28 in that span (92.9 percent, tied
for third among all teams).
The Caps did a reasonably good job of limiting shots,
considering all the time they spent shorthanded. In 26:38 spent shorthanded (third-highest for
the week, behind only Anaheim and the Rangers), the Caps allowed two goals on
20 shots.
Faceoffs: 91-for-223 / 40.8 percent (season: 45.5
percent/31st)
At this point, with ten games left in the season, one hopes
that the Caps do not find themselves having to win an important draw in the
last seconds of a game, because if they do, there just is not enough success
memory here to give anyone confidence they can do so. In the larger scheme of things, faceoff do
not matter in the sea of plays a team will experience over the course of a
season. But there can be that instance
in which an outcome boils down to performing the game’s most basic play well.
Week 24 was another week of poor performances in the
circle. That they finished barely over 40
percent is not unusual, but the two games under 40 percent made it four times
in seven games they failed to hit that mark for a game, and they have only two
games over 50 percent in their last 16 contests.
The Caps did not hit 50 percent in either end in any game
this week, while twice in the four games they were over 50 percent in the
neutral zone. Not surprisingly, it was
in the neutral zone where they fared best overall (44.0 percent), while going
40.5 percent in the offensive zone and 36.7 percent in the defensive end.
Individually, Chandler Stephenson was the only player among
the five taking at least ten faceoffs to win at least half of his draws, going
6-for-11 for the week (54.5 percent). If
one is looking for a silver lining here, Evgeny Kuznetsov won 14 of 27
offensive zone draws to finish over 50 percent there for the week (51.9
percent).
Goals by Period:
It was a balanced week in this category with the goals
scored and goals allowed spread almost evenly among the periods. The Caps scored first in the first period in
three of the four games (winning two of them) and took a lead to the first
intermission twice (winning once), that Pittsburgh game being the problem, the
product of a brief, but intense second period collapse. Third periods were odd in that they featured
so many empty net goals. Each game for
the week featured at least one, the Caps scoring empty netters in their two
wins and allowing empty netters in both losses (a total of three goals, two by
Tampa Bay). It brought to five the
consecutive games played by the Caps that featured at least one empty net goal.
What still stands out, though, is how little of the Capitals’
offense comes in the third periods of games.
With 67 third period goals scored so far, only nine teams have fewer,
and among them only the St. Louis Blues and Columbus Blue Jackets are currently
playoff eligible. And, when one
considers that the 86 third period goals allowed by the Caps is tied for
third-most overall, that minus-19 third period goal differential should be
cause for some concern.
Year-over-Year:
The Capitals have spent a lot of the 2019 portion of the
season hovering around numbers comparable to those they put up in equal volumes
of games the previous season, and it is no exception at the end of Week
24. One win and two points better than
last season, special teams production virtually identical to last season, the
Caps resemble last year’s team in the big respects. That might not be surprising for a club that
had so few changes in their roster, year over year. The Caps continue to be ahead of last year’s
pace in the grittier aspects of the game – hits, blocked shots, turnovers for
and against. Two categories continue to
trail last year’s pace – penalties/penalty minutes and faceoffs. This is neither surprising, nor should it be
expected to change much in the last few weeks, given that the changes reflect
absences – Tom Wilson at the start of the season (suspension) accounting for
most of the difference in penalties/penalty minutes and Jay Beagle, who took
his faceoff skills to Vancouver in the off season.
In the end…
Week 24 for the Caps was the first of four weeks of a brutal
schedule that features 12 of 14 games against playoff eligible teams or teams
on the edge trying to get in. That the
Caps split the four games for this week was a decent result, given that three
of the games were on the road. However,
the unforgiving nature of the remaining schedule does place their top-seed in
the Metropolitan Division in jeopardy.
When one considers that the Caps were one shot away from earning at
least a point in Pittsburgh and a pipe struck in the last minute away from earning
at least a point in Tampa Bay, one cannot help but think that the Caps are
going to have to stop leaving spare change in the cushions as the schedule
heads into its final three weeks if they are to keep their top seed, or perhaps
even keep home ice advantage for the first round.
Three Stars:
- First Star: John Carlson (2-3-5, plus-1, one power play goal, nine blocked shots, 25:21 in average ice time)
- Second Star: Alex Ovechkin (2-2-4, minus-1, 18 shots on goal, 37 shot attempts, 15 hits, 246th career power play goal, tying Phil Esposito for fifth place all time; became the 49th player in league history to record 1,200 career points)
- Third Star: Brett Connolly (2-2-4, even, game-winning goal)