The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Game 44: Capitals at Predators, January 16th

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

The Washington Capitals are 14-1-4 in their last 19 games, compiling the best record in the league over that span.  In all those games, however, there is one thing they did not do.  They did not face the team with the best record in the league.  On Friday night, the Caps will do just that as they head to Nashville to take on the Predators.

Nashville is not quite as hot as the Caps at the moment, but they are not far off that pace. The Predators will face the Caps holding a six-game winning streak on home ice.  Overall they have won four in a row and have points in nine straight games (7-0-2). 

If there is a theme in the Nashville 7-0-2 run over their last nine games, it is “everyone in the pool!”  The Predators have 15 different players sharing in the 35 goals scored, and they have a whopping 21 skaters recording points.  Even goalie Pekka Rinne got involved in the scoring with an assist in Nashville’s 5-4 Gimmick loss to the Chicago Blackhawks on December 29^th.

Colin Wilson is the goals and points leader in this recent set of games (6-8-14).  Wilson, a seventh overall draft pick of the Predators in 2008, is having a breakout season.  Coming into the 2014-2015 season Wilson had three 30-point seasons and had a career high of 16 goals set in 2010-2011, his sophomore season.  In 40 games so far this season he has 14 goals, already in striking range of his career high.  The same applies to his 30 points, just five off his career high of 35, set in 2011-2012 in 68 games.  He has points in nine of his last 11 games overall (8-9-17) and comes into this game on a personal four-game points streak (3-5-8).  In six career games against the Caps he is 1-1-2, minus-1.

What is amazing about Wilson’s production is that he is doing it from the second line.  The top line of Mike Ribeiro, Filip Forsberg, and Craig Smith has been even more productive.  The trio has combined for 37 of the Predators’ 126 goals scored, almost 30 percent of the total.  In the 7-0-2 run, though, the goals have been a bit less frequent.  Smith has three, and Forsberg has two.  Ribeiro has not lit the lamp, but he does have ten assists in those nine games.

Forsberg, as every Caps fan knows, was a Washington draft pick.  OK, the trade that sent him to Nashville for Martin Erat and Michael Latta didn’t go quite as planned.  Move on.  Forsberg is in his first full season, and while he is a rookie, he is displaying a consistency that one would expect of a veteran.  He has not had more than two straight games without a point since he had a three-game streak (his only one) back in late November.  He has a six-game goal streak to his credit this season, and he leads all rookies in goals (15, tied with Ottawa’s Mike Hoffman) and points (39, seven more than Calgary’s Johnny Gaudreau).  He has been a fixture on Nashville’s power play to the point where his 11 power play points is comfortably ahead of all other rookies (Gaudreau has eight power play points).

On defense, Nashville has five defensemen in double-digits in points.  Two – Shea Weber and Roman Josi – are pushing up against 30 points (Weber: 29; Josi: 27).  Weber, a perennial in terms of Norris Trophy discussion, is well known to hockey fans.  Josi is perhaps less well known.  Last season, Josi came into his own.  His 40 points in 72 games more than doubled his point total combined over his first two seasons (34 in 120 games).  This season, he might do even better.  With a a scoring line of 7-20-27 in 42 games, he is on a pace to finish 14-39-53.

Here is how the teams stack up against one another overall:

1.  Mike Ribeiro does not have a goal in his last dozen games.  He does, however, have a dozen assists in those dozen games.  It has allowed him to climb into a tie for seventh overall in assists (29, tied with Tyler Johnson and Nicklas Backstrom).

2.  Nashville seems to jump on teams early, then stand on their throats late.  The Predators have a plus-10 goal differential in the first period of games so far and a plus-17 goal-differential in the third period of games. 

3.  What is odd about the first period goal differential is that the Predators have so few instances of carrying a lead into the first intermission.  They have done so only 14 times in 42 games; 12 teams have done it more often.

4.  Nashville can play teams close, and they can blow them out.  Only two teams – Anaheim (21-0-6) and Florida (14-3-9)  – have earned points in more one-goal decisions than the Predators (18-4-4).  Nashville also has the best winning percentage in games decided by three or more goals (.889/8-1).

5.  If there is a weakness here, there are no teams in the league with fewer power play goals at home than the Predators.  They are tied with Buffalo and Florida with seven man advantage goals on home ice, and they are tied with Buffalo for the lowest conversion rate at home (10.4 percent).

1.  This will be the first time that the Caps have played outside the Eastern time zone since November 20^th, when they beat the Colorado Avalanche in Denver, 3-2.

2.  The Caps have not lost to a Western Conference team on the road since November 15^th, when they lost at St. Louis, 4-1.  That loss is the Caps’ only one to a Central Division team so far this season (4-1-0).

3.  The Caps have settled into a consistency, whether they are at home or on the road.  Goals for: 2.90 at home, 2.91 on the road.  Goals against: 2.38 at home, 2.40 on the road.  Power play: 23.9/23.2.  Penalty kill: 83.1/75.7.  OK, that road penalty kill is a problem.  They are a little better lately, 81.5 percent over their last six road contests (22-for-27).

4.  The Caps (which you can read as meaning “Braden Holtby”) have allowed two or fewer goals in six of seven games to start the new year.

5.  When Holtby beat the Flyers, 1-0, on Wednesday, he became the first Capital to record a 1-0 shutout win since Tomas Vokoun beat Pittsburgh by that score on January 11, 2012.  Holtby lost a 1-0 “shutout” when Tampa Bay defeated the Caps, 1-0, in a Gimmick to close the 2013-2014 season.

The Peerless’ Players to Ponder

Nashville: Carter Hutton

Pekka Rinne suffered a sprained knee in the third period of Nashville’s 5-1 win over Vancouver on Tuesday and is expected to be out 3-5 weeks.  That means that the goaltending duties fall to Carter Hutton.  It is worth noting that Rinne has all 29 Nashville wins this season.  Hutton has appeared in six games without earning a win (0-3-2, one no-decision).  His goals against average is substantially worse than Rinne’s (2.60 to 1.96), and his save percentage is similarly below that of Rinne (.905 to .931).  This should surprise no one, since Rinne is an annual focus of Vezina Trophy discussion at this point of his career (when he is healthy).  Hutton’s 2014-2015 numbers are, however, consistent with his career numbers (20-15-6, 2.63, .909, one shutout).  Nashville has enough offense so that Hutton need only limit mistakes; he does not need to be Rinne-like in his performance for Nashville to maintain its lofty status in the West.  He has one career appearance against the Caps, a 4-3 win last March 30^th in which he stopped 23 of 26 shots.

Washington: Brooks Laich

With the Caps facing a backup goaltender thrust into a starting role, one of the things the team might want to attend to is get in his line of sight and crowd the crease.  It would be nice if Brooks Laich could fill that role.  Well, it would apply to Troy Brouwer, Joel Ward, Jason Chimera, or Eric Fehr, too.  It would be particularly good to get Laich going, though.  He had the game-winning goal in the Caps’ 6-2 win over Toronto on January 7^th, his second goal in consecutive games at the time.  Those, however, are his only two goals in his last 16 games, and he is on a pace to finish the season with 12 goals.  Against a team like Nashville, which possesses considerable depth on offense, getting secondary scoring from Laich (or Brouwer, or Ward, or…you get the point) could be the key to success.  Laich is 1-2-3, minus-1, in eight career games against Nashville.

In the end…

This will be a measuring stick game, even if Nashville is without Pekka Rinne in goal.  The Predators have the league’s best home record (17-2-1) and have not lost at home since dropping a 3-1 decision to Chicago on December 6^th.  Since then, Nashville is 6-0-0 on home ice and has outscored opponents by a 20-10 margin.

The Caps have had some odd, well…luck of a sort recently.  Against Florida, starting goalie Roberto Luongo was injured, and the Caps won.  They beat Detroit when starting goalie Jimmy Howard went down to injury.  They beat the Flyers’ number three goalie on Wednesday.  Now, they get Nashville without Pekka Rinne available for duty.  No one wishes that kind of misfortune to hit any team, even opponents, but these are games to be won, no matter what the circumstances.

Capitals 3 – Predators 2

A TWO-point night -- Game 43: Capitals 1 - Flyers 0

You can read the recap we penned for Japers’ Rink here, but we had a few more thoughts on last night’s 1-0 Washington Capitals win over the Philadelphia Flyers.

-- Give Flyer goalie Rob Zepp credit for playing a very good, under-control game in what could have been a difficult setting, on the road against a very hot team.  But the Caps shot in some bad luck, too.  Alex Ovechkin hits a crossbar, and the puck stays out.  Jay Beagle beats Zepp cleanly over his left shoulder from point blank range, but there is too much air under the puck, and it sails into the netting.  Eric Fehr has an insurance goal on his stick, but he is unable to lift the puck over Zepp’s left pad.  Zepp was good, but the hockey gods were smiling on him, too.

-- Streaks are funny things.  When a club is going badly, you can tell when they are coming out of it.  They play better, but they are not immediately rewarded.  It might take a couple of games to turn “playing better” into wins.  The same goes for hot streaks.  A team shows cracks, gets lackadaisical, takes short cuts, but it might take a game or two before they are burned by the deterioration in play.  That was what the Caps had the look of last night, especially after the first eight minutes.  Give them credit for playing a disciplined game in many respects, making the Flyers negotiate the entire ice surface to mount any offensive push.  But their offense looked disinterested in spots, disjointed in others.

-- Andre Burakovsky is going to be a fine player, and one can see him improving almost on a game-to-game basis in terms of being comfortable on the ice and not playing outside his skill and comfort zone.  But the fact is that the right wing slot on the top line has been a revolving door for much of the season.  It might be that the solution, at least for this year, is going to be found at the trading deadline.  The first big in-season move in the tenure of Brian MacLellan, perhaps.

-- For all the nonsense being tossed Brooks Orpik’s way this season – he’s too old, his contract is too big, he’s slow – his nine points this season (all assists) is not far off his mark last season (2-11-13), and he is a plus-8.  Add in that he is averaging almost three minutes of penalty killing time a night and more than 22 minutes overall, and he seems entirely worthy of the trust the coaching staff seems to have in him.

-- It is hard to notice Jack Hillen on a game to game, or even a shift to shift basis.  He does not get a lot of ice time, but there he is these days, playing the solid pro, hardly a liability as the Caps work through some injury issues on the third defensive pair. Since December 20th he is 0-4-4, plus-2, in ten games.

-- Holding the Flyers’ duo of Claude Giroux and Jakub Voracek to two shots apiece is as good an example of any of how the Caps’ philosophy has changed.  Those two players had 31 goals between them going into last night’s game and had 31 goals between them at the end of it.  Credit to the players and the coaches for throwing a blanket over them.

-- The Flyers are a mess on the back end.  Some of that is injury (Braydon Coburn and Niklas Grossman out on the blue line, as was goaltender Steve Mason).  But the defense the Flyers iced last night looked rather weak in their own end, a lot of the same kind of defenseman – puck movers who were not particularly strong along the wall in one-on-one battles.  It made the Caps offensive performance a bit more disappointing.  A lot of hard work along the walls was not rewarded.

-- Matt Niskanen was our “player to ponder” in the prognosto for this game, the focus of which was his disappointing offense compared to last season’s breakout year in Pittsburgh, but entirely consistent with his career performance otherwise.  What he showed last night was a different side to his game, a certain orneriness, first with his hit that leveled Scott Laughton and sent the Flyer to the locker room for the duration, then not letting the Flyer chirping about it get him off his game.

-- Is it me, or have the Brothers Schenn regressed?  We had no idea what they were doing for considerable stretches last night, except for trying to get Tom Wilson to do something stupid.  Good on Wilson for not indulging them.

The Caps are going to move up in weight class this weekend with back-to-back games in Nashville and Dallas.  While there is much to cheer about in a 1-0 win over a hated rival, the Caps will have to be more consistent in their effort against those teams if they are to come out of the weekend with any standings points.

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Game 43: Flyers at Capitals, January 14th

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

When last we saw the Washington Capitals and the Philadelphia Flyers, the home team was celebrating a 3-2 overtime win over the Capitals on a power play goal by Jakub Voracek.  The Capitals get to return the favor on Wednesday night before a national television audience at Verizon Center as the Flyers make their first visit of the season to 7^th Street.

Philadelphia comes into this game on what for them, at least this season, is a tear.  The Flyers have won three of their last four games, all at home, the fifth time this season that the Flyers have won three of four games (they do not have a four-game winning streak).  The good fortune could not have come at a better time.  Before their recent push, the Flyers lost five in a row (0-4-1) and were in danger of dropping out of playoff consideration altogether.

As it is, Philadelphia is hanging by a thread to playoff relevance.  As they head to Washington, the Flyers are 11 points behind the New York Rangers for fourth place in the Metropolitan Division, and they are 11 points behind the Boston Bruins for the second wild card spot.  If 97 points is what it takes to get a playoff spot (Boston’s current pace), the Flyers will need 56 points in their last 39 games, a 118-point pace over an 82-game season.  It’s not impossible, but it would not be the way to bet.

Even the Flyers’ recent three wins in four games has a bit of a mirage quality to it.  They defeated Ottawa in a Gimmick, beat Washington on an overtime power play, then lost to precisely the team they had to beat – Boston, by a 3-1 margin – before putting together what might be their best performance of the season, a 7-3 win over the Atlantic Division-leading Tampa Bay Lightning. 

The win over Tampa Bay just made the strange run stranger in that head coach Craig Berube started Rob Zepp in goal in what was just Zepp’s second NHL appearance.  Zepp, a former fourth-round draft pick of the Carolina Hurricanes, has won both of his NHL appearances without the benefit of saving as many as 90 percent of the shots he faced in either game.

Until the Flyers lit up the Lightning for seven goals they were having trouble lightning the lamp.  In five games leading up to that goal-fest, the Flyers managed to score a total of eight goals, three of them against the Capitals.  As it is, 15 goals in six games to start 2015, almost half of them in one game, is neither especially productive nor efficient.

Three players – R.J. Umberger, Chris Vandevelde, and Voracek – lead the team in 2015 scoring with two goals apiece.  Voracek is the league’s leading scorer (17-35-52), so his production hardly seems surprising.  However, Umberger and Vandevelde have combined for just 10 goals in 76 man-games between them. 

Those on whom the Flyers depend more for goal scoring have been largely absent in the new year.  Wayne Simmonds has 16 goals this season but only one in his last nine contests.  Claude Giroux has 14 goals for the year, but he has only one in five games in the new year.  Michael Raffl has 11 goals in 35 games overall but only one in his last nine games, that coming in the barrage against Tampa Bay on Monday.

Here is how the teams compare overall:

1.  Slow starts are rather common for the Flyers.  Only 16 times in 43 games have they scored first, and their 11-4-3 is the 14^th-best winning percentage (.688) in the league.  It gets worse when they trail first.  Only three teams have more losses overall than the Flyers (17 losses in regulation, four in extra time) when trailing first – Edmonton (23 losses) and Buffalo (24).  This is not the sort of company a team with playoff aspiration wants to keep.

2.  No team has allowed more power play goals on the road than Philadelphia (25), and they have the second worst penalty kill rate in the league on the road (68.0 percent).  Only Buffalo (67.6 percent) is worse.

3.  Penalty killing is killing the team in another respect.  On a period-by-period basis, the Flyers are not doing badly overall in goal differential: minus-3 in the first period of games, minus-1 in the second period, and minus-4 in the third period.  They also have scored more 5-on-5 goals (75) than they have allowed (74).  But while they have the third highest number of power play goals scored overall (34), they have allowed more than any other team (38).

4.  Philadelphia is one of two teams (Toronto is the other) with three players among the top dozen in power play goals scored: Wayne Simmonds (tied for third with nine), Claude Giroux (tied for sixth with eight), and Jakub Voracek (tied for 12^th with seven).

5.  If it comes to a Gimmick, Flyer goaltenders have the third worst save percentage in the league (.583/14-for-24) and the sixth-worst shooting percentage (20.8/5-for-24)

1.  The Caps have displayed a consistency at a high-level on defense in at least one respect.  They are in the top-ten in fewest goals allowed by each period: 29 goals against in the first period (sixth-fewest) in the league), 36 goals in the second period (tenth), and 33 goals in the third period (tied for eighth).  Unfortunately, only three teams (Edmonton, Colorado, and Dallas, all with six) have allowed more goals in overtime than the Caps (5).

2.  Washington has the second-best winning percentage in the league in games decided by three or more goals (.778/7-2).  It seems it is harder to blow out a Barry Trotz-coached team.

3.  On the other hand, only three teams (Calgary, Ottawa, and Tampa Bay) have been shut out fewer times than the Caps, who have been blanked only once this season, that on November 14 by the Devils, 1-0.

4.  John Carlson is top-five among defensemen in assists (T-2nd/26), points (T-4th/31), and plus-minus (T-6th/+15); and he has done it while ranking only 35th among defensemen in average ice time per game (23:20).

5.  Only St. Louis’ Vladimir Tarasenko (7) and Ottawa’s Mike Hoffman (6) have scored a game’s first goal more times than has Alex Ovechkin (5).

The Peerless’ Players to Ponder

Philadelphia: Ray Emery

With Steve Mason expected to miss two weeks to a lower body injury, the question for the Flyers is who can they turn to in goal?  Ray Emery did not do very well in relief of Mason when he was injured against Boston – three goals allowed on 13 shots in a 3-1 loss – and he was left on the bench in favor of Rob Zepp against Tampa Bay because head coach Craig Berube “liked his energy.”  Emery has struggled quite a bit this season.  His 7-7-1 win-loss record might be charitable given his 3.21 goals against average and his .889 save percentage.  It gets worse.  After going 4-0-1, 2.44, .924 in his first five appearances this season, Emery is 3-7-0, 3.57, .869 in his last 11 appearances.  If Mason is out two weeks, and Zepp’s energy has a shelf life, then Emery is going to have to be a wall in goal, or the Flyers’ season will be over by the end of the month.

Washington: Matt Niskanen

Matt Niskanen is on a pace to finish the season with a scoring line of 4-21-25, well off last year’s 10-36-46 with the Pittsburgh Penguins. However, that season in Pittsburgh would seem to be the exception of Niskanen’s eight-year career. Taking away his 2013-2014 results, Niskanen has averaged 5-19-24 per 82 games. He is having a very “Niskanen” year, at least in terms of his offensive output. However, he has only one point in his last 14 games, an assist in the Caps’ 6-2 win over Toronto last Wednesday. He is part of decidedly “right-handed” offense from the blue line (all three Caps defensemen with at least ten points are right-handed shots), but he is in a bit of a slump at the moment. In 20 career games against the Flyers, Niskanen is 2-6-8, minus-6.

In the end...

The Caps have not been flashy in their recent 13-1-4 run, and that style would suit them well in their rematch against the Flyers.  Philadelphia comes into this game perhaps not playing quite as well as their recent 3-1-0 record would suggest, and there are the usual goaltending issues with injury sprinkled in.  

This game could serve as a nice springboard for the Caps before they head to the road to meet Nashville and Dallas.  On the other hand, it is a team good enough to bite the Caps in the backside (again) if they are taken lightly.  Guess which way we think this goes...

Capitals 4 - Flyers 1

A TWO-point night -- Game 42: Capitals 2 - Avalanche 1

The Washington Capitals defeated the Colorado Avalanche on Monday night, 2-1, at Verizon Center to win their 13^th game in their last 18 tries (13-1-4).  The win jumped the Caps over the New York Rangers for third in the Metropolitan Division and drew Washington to within three points of the top spot held by the New York Islanders.

The Caps broke on top in the eighth minute of the contest on some diligent work by the fourth line.  Jay Beagle started and finished the scoring play.  After Beagle won a faceoff to the left of goaltender Semyon Varlamov, Mike Green gathered the puck along the right wing wall.  Green slid the puck across to Tom Wilson, who took a long range shot from the middle of the ice.  Wilson’s shot did not get through, but Jason Chimera fought off a pair of Colorado defenders to nudge the puck out to Beagle in the slot.  Beagle found room enough to flip a backhand past Varlamov, and the Caps had a 1-0 lead.

That would be how the teams went to the first intermission, and it was the Avalanche who would draw first blood in the middle period, Alex Tanguay scoring on a power play.

With the score tied late in the second period, it was the Caps who would strike on a power play.  The Caps worked the puck around the back of the Colorado net, Marcus Johansson along the wall to Nicklas Backstrom up the right wing wall.  Backstrom found Troy Brouwer in the middle, and Brouwer wasted no time backhanding a pass to the left wing faceoff circle where Alex Ovechkin was waiting.  Ovechkin snapped the puck through Varlamov’s pads, and the Caps had a 2-1 lead.

After that it was up to goalie Braden Holtby, perhaps too much so.  Holtby was peppered with 18 shots in the third period (after facing only 14 in the first and second periods, combined), but he stopped all of them, and the Caps skated off with a 2-1 win.

Other stuff…

-- Holtby stopped 31 of 32 shots and is now among the top ten goaltenders in the league in goals-against average (2.23/ninth), save percentage (.923/tenth), shutouts (3/tied for third), and minutes (2,148/third).

-- Ovechkin’s goal was his fifth game winner of the season, tied for second in the league.  It was also his 74^th career game winner, a franchise record.

-- The 38 shots on goal for the Caps was the most recorded in a game since they had 41 in a 3-2 overtime loss to Columbus on December 11^th.  It is the most they had in a win in regulation time this season.

-- The Caps dominated the faceoff circle in the ends.  In the offensive zone they were 15-for-25 (60.0 percent), and in the defensive zone they were 14-for-24 (58.3 percent).

-- Jay Beagle extended his career best total in goals, recording his sixth of the season in the first period.  He is on a pace for 12 goals, which would almost double his career total coming into this season (13).

-- Tom Wilson had four shots on goal, breaking a streak of five games without one.  The four shots were the most he recorded in a game since putting five pucks on net in a 6-2 loss to Toronto on November 28^th.

-- The power play goal made if five games in six to start 2015 in which the Caps scored an extra-man goal (5-for16/31.3 percent).

-- The Caps extended their longest home winning streak of the season to six games and have points earned in seven straight games at Verizon Center.

-- Jason Chimera’s assist broke a string of nine games in which he did not record a point.  He did not have a shot on goal (did not have a shot attempt, the only Capital without one), his fourth straight and seventh in eight games without a shot on goal.

-- The win was Washington’s 22nd when scoring the game’s first goal, tops in the league.  Four teams are tied for second with 19 wins, and it reads like the league’s elite this season – Anaheim, Pittsburgh, Chicago, and the New York Rangers.  The Caps have the second-best winning percentage when scoring first (.846/22-1-3).

In the end…

Try not to spend much time explaining why the Caps are on this roll.  Just enjoy it.  They don’t come very often, even among the best teams.  The Caps are 13-1-4 in their last 18 games, almost a quarter of the season.  It is a 137-point pace over that span of games, and the club is on an overall pace to finish with 105 points.  Before one gets too complacent, though, that 105 point pace is just fourth best in the Metropolitan Division at the moment.  Pittsburgh (112), the New York Islanders (111), and the New York Rangers (109) are all currently at a better points pace. 

This win over the Avalanche merely starts the second half of the season.  With 40 games left, nothing is guaranteed.  But right now it sure does feel good.

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Game 42: Avalanche at Capitals, January 12th

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

The Washington Capitals venture outside the Eastern Conference for an opponent – only the second time since December 2^nd – when they host the Colorado Avalanche at Verizon Center on Monday night.  The Caps will be looking to sweep the season series against the Avalanche, having won the teams’ previous meeting, 3-2, in Denver on November 20^th.   Doing so would return the favor done the Caps last season when Colorado swept both games, 5-1 in Washington and 4-1 in Denver.

Colorado came off last year’s first playoff appearance in four seasons full of promise when the 2014-2015 season began.  Chock full of young talent, the Avs were looking to make the next leap forward toward a place among the elite teams in the league.  Things did not work out that way to start the season.  Colorado lost six of their first seven games and 13 of their first 17 games before they won consecutive games for the first time this season, on November 13-15.  As late as December 9^th the Avalanche had yet to reach the ten-win mark, a record of 9-13-6. 

Since then, however, they have bent the arc of progress forward more to their liking.  Colorado is 9-3-2 in their last 14 games and come into their game against the Caps on a three-game winning streak.  Over those 14 games the Avalanche’s leading goal scorer has been defenseman Erik Johnson (8-1-9).  The goal-scoring binge has Johnson leading all NHL defensemen in goals scored for the season (12).   The former first overall pick in the 2006 entry draft has already established a career best in goals scored, and with 22 points is on a pace (44 points) to set a career high in points as well.  Johnson is 2-4-6, plus-1, in six career games against Washington.

Gabriel Landeskog leads the Avalanche in overall scoring in their 9-3-2 run (1-9-10).  He is still on a pace, however, to fall far short of his 26-goal/65-point season of last year.  He was plagued by a slow start that left him with only four goals and six points in his first 18 games.  He is still on a sluggish goal-scoring pace (16, on a full season basis), owing in part to a shooting percentage (6.3) that is barely half as efficient as what he recorded last season (11.7).  In four career appearances against the Caps, Landeskog is 1-5-6, plus-4.

Another of the young cohort who has had a sluggish first half of the season is forward Ryan O’Reilly.  After posting career highs in goals (28) and points (64) last season, O’ Reilly is on a pace to finish this season with just 14 goals and 45 points.  He, too, has suffered a lack of shooting productivity, his shooting percentage resembling Landeskog’s in that it is barely half as good as last year’s mark (7.8 this season; 13.9 last season).  Where his performance differs from Landeskog’s is that he had not suffered a slow start as much as he has had a consistently mediocre output over the course of the season.  He does not have a points streak of more than two games, and he does not have a streak without a point of more than three games.  O’Reilly is 0-1-1, even, in six career games against the Caps.

In goal, Semyon Varlamov’s season would be familiar to Caps fans in that he has had three separate absences due to groin injury problems.  It has contributed to an inconsistency in his game this season in which he has a goals-against average about a third of a goal higher than last year (2.77 versus 2.41) while still posting three shutouts, one off his career best (four in 2011-2012).  Since returning from his latest bout with groin problems, Varlamov is 6-2-0, 1.97, .940, with two shutouts in eight appearances.  Varlamov is 2-0-0, 1.00, .973 in two career appearances against his former team.

1.  Colorado does fairly well in one-goal games (11-7-8) but are under .500 in games decided by more than one goal (7-9).  The Avs have a 4-1-0 record in their last five one-goal games.

2.  The Avalanche put themselves in a bind in one important facet of the game.  Only four teams have faced more shorthanded situations than Colorado.  While their 22 power play goals allowed is quite respectable (eighth-fewest in the league), spending so much time killing penalties (fourth most shorthanded ice time in the league) keeps them out of rhythm.

3.  Colorado does not have high end scoring; their leading scorers (Alex Tanguay and Jarome Iginla) are tied for 72^nd in points.  But they do have balance.  The Avalanche have eight skaters with at least 20 points.

4.  Colorado often finds itself behind the eight ball early in games.  Only four teams have scored first in games fewer times than the Avalanche, and Colorado’s 9-7-1 record in those games is the sixth-worst winning percentage (.529) in the league.

5.  The Avalanche have not done especially well late in games, either, although in this case such things are relative.  Their 10-2-2 record when leading after two periods is the fourth-worst such winning percentage (.714) in the league.

1.  The Caps have three players with ten or more power play points: Nicklas Backstrom (1-14-15), Alex Ovechkin (9-5-14), and Marcus Johansson (1-9-10).

2.  The Caps are one of two teams (the Islanders are the other) with two players in the top-five in hits.  Brooks Orpik is fourth (160), and Alex Ovechkin is fifth (143).

3.  Orpik is also third in the league in blocked shots (110), making him the only player in the league in the top five in hits and blocked shots.

4.  Nicklas Backstrom is the epitome of consistency.  His home scoring line is 7-13-20, plus-2, in 19 games.  His road scoring line is 6-15-21, plus-2, in 22 games.  H has six power play points in 19 games at home, eight in 22 games on the road.  His shooting percentage is 15.6 at home, 15.4 percent on the road.

5.  Speaking of which, Alex Ovechkin comes into this game with a remarkable consistency of his own.  In 362 career road games his has 221 goals and shoots to a 12.2 percent rate.  In 358 career road games he has 222 goals and shoots to, wait for it… a 12.2 percent rate.

The Peerless’ Players to Ponder

Colorado: Jarome Iginla

In the prognosto preceding the Saturday game against Detroit, we remarked that Pavel Datsyuk does not seem to age.  The same might be said for Colorado’s Jarome Iginla.  The Avalanche forward is on a pace to finish the 2014-2015 season with his 15^th consecutive season with at least 20 goals (not including the abbreviated 2012-2013 season).   He is currently tied (with Alex Tanguay) for the team lead in points (27), and he is tied (with Tanguay and Erik Johnson) for the team lead in goals (12).  He has five goals in his last nine games, including a pair in the Avalanche’s 5-2 win over the Ottawa Senators last Thursday.  Iginla has shaken off a slow start (two goals in his first 20 games this season) to resume what, for him, is a normal goal scoring pace.  The concession to age in Iginla’s case is his ice time.  He is averaging 17:27 a game, which is his lowest average ice time since he averaged 16:30 a game in the 1998-1999 season.  In 22 career games against Washington, Iginla is 8-10-18, minus-3.

Washington: Jason Chimera

While Washington has put together a fine 12-1-4 stretch of games over the last five weeks, things have not gone nearly so well for Jason Chimera.  Over those same 17 games, Chimera is 1-2-3, plus-2.  In fact, Chimera has only one goal in his last 20 games on just 20 shots.  In 11 of those 20 games he did not register a shot on goal.  And, his ice time has been curtailed severely.  He skated fewer than ten minutes in three of his last five games.  Chimera has been a victim of wide swings in his goal-scoring over the past four seasons – 20 in 82 games in 2011-2012, 3 in 47 games the following season, 15 in 82 games last season, and he is on a pace for only six this season.  In 29 career games against Colorado, Chimera is 7-8-15, minus-1.

In the end…

Last season, the Caps plainly could not handle Colorado’s speed in being outscored by a 9-2 margin in two games.  In the teams’ first meeting this season the Caps negated the speed advantage for the Avs by playing a slow and steady game, relying on patience to lull the Avalanche into mistakes.  It didn’t hurt having the captain recording a goal and an assist, either.  It also happened to be a contest in which Chimera scored one of his three goals this season.  The Caps might need that formula again – getting their scoring lines to produce, but getting something out of the bottom half of the forward lines as well.  It is something that the Caps have had on a regular basis over the last five weeks, and that spells trouble for the visitors.

Capitals 4 – Avalanche 3

Washington Capitals: That Was The Week That Was -- Week 14

The Washington Capitals packed a lot into Week 14 of the 2014-2015 season.  Four games, three wins, two opposing goaltenders -- Florida's Roberto Luongo and Detroit's Jimmy Howard -- knocked out of games, and one of their best weeks of the season.  How did they get there?

Record: 3-0-1

The Caps had their first four-game week since Week 5, their first three-win week of the season, and their best standings points week of the season (seven).  Week 14 was the Caps’ sixth straight week in the green (winning week) and their eighth straight non-losing week.  In that respect, Washington has achieved a consistency about their game.  Only twice in 14 weeks have they been on the losing side of the ledger.

Wins over Florida, Toronto, and Detroit made it four straight wins and 6-0-1 in their last seven decisions against the Atlantic Division.  Those wins, plus an overtime loss to the Philadelphia Flyers, brought the Caps’ record to 12-1-4 in their last 17 games.  The 28 points earned over 17 games – more than one-fifth of the season – is the most the Caps have earned in a 17-game block of games since they earned 29 standings points in going 14-2-1 from March 21 – April 23, 2013.

Offense 3.75/game (season: 2.98/game; rank: 8th)

The Caps recorded 15 goals in the four games of Week 14.  Ten different players shared in the bounty, led by Alex Ovechkin with three.  Overall scoring had an odd, and welcome, aspect to it.  Eric Fehr continued his productive play of late, leading the Caps in points for the week (2-3-5). One of Fehr’s goals was Washington’s first shorthanded goal of the season, against the Toronto Maple Leafs in a 6-2 win, and it was part of an overall effort that left Fehr 6-3-9 over his last seven games.

Marcus Johansson had a pair of goals in the win over Toronto, his first two-goal game since Veterans Day against Columbus, and his fifth multi-goal game of his career.

Washington had points from six different defensemen this week.  John Carlson led the way with four points (1-3-4), and at week’s end he was fourth in the league in scoring among defensemen (5-26-31) and tied with Calgary’s Mark Giordano for second in assists.  Meanwhile, Mike Green had three assists, and at the end of Week 14 he ranked fifth among defensemen in assists per game (0.58; minimum: 20 games played).

Then there was Karl Alzner.  Never much of a scorer at the NHL level over his seven-year career to date, Alzner had a goal and an assist in Week 14, the goal giving him a career-high three goals for the season.

Defense: 2.25/game (season: 2.49/game; rank: 10th)

The Caps were out-shot in all four games in Week 14, the totals being 97 for the Capitals and 125 for opponents.  When Washington held Detroit to 27 shots in the last game of the week, it was the first time the Caps held an opponent under 30 shots holding the New York Rangers to 27 shots in a 4-2 loss on December 27^th.  The Caps had allowed more than 30 shots in six consecutive games until the Detroit contest (the Caps went 4-0-2 in those games).

It was not an especially good week overall, possession-wise.  Washington had a 5-on-5 even strength Corsi-for percentage of just 46.07.  Part of that was score effect; the Caps had a Corsi-for of 57.25 for the week at 5-on-5 in tied-game situations.  Then again, part of it was not.  When leading by one goal the Corsi-for percentage was 37.65 percent.  But, here is the thing.  The Caps were good when they had to be.  Washington trailed for only 6:51 in Week 14, all of it in their contest against Florida to open the week (a 4-3 win).

Goaltending:  GAA 2.25 / .928 SV (season: 2.43 / .914 / 3 SO)

Braden Holtby had a record-setting week, smashing the franchise record for consecutive appearances.  When he took the ice against the Philadelphia Flyers on Thursday, it was his 23^rd straight appearance in goal for the Caps, breaking the record of 22 straight, set by Wayne Stephenson in the 1979-1980 season.  He extended that streak to 24 with his appearance against Detroit to end Week 14.

Holtby had a bit of an odd work week that reflected equal parts score effect and effective play.  In one respect he had a “sandwich” week in which the filling was a little meager.  In the first periods of games he stopped 29 of 30 shots (a .967 save percentage), and in the third periods of games he stopped 52 of 54 shots (.963).  In the second period, however, it was 34-for-39 (.872).  You could say he was effective when he had to be – early and late.  Then there were those shots – 30 first period shots faced, 39 in the second period, and 54 in the third period (he stopped one of two shots in the 3-2 overtime loss to Philadelphia).

The long string of appearances left Justin Peters with a lot of rust.  He has played only 40 minutes since November 15^th.  That being the case, he was sent to Hershey for a conditioning stint with the Bears to sharpen his game.  That he does sharpen his game is going to be important.  The Caps will be playing in six back-to-back sets of games over the next  six weeks.  Peters stopped all 24 shots he faced in shuttingout the Albany Devils in his first appearance for the Bears on Friday night.  Pheonix Copley dressed as backup for the Caps in their 3-1 win over Detroit on Saturday in his first call-up to the big club.

Power Play: 3-for-9 / 33.3 percent (season: 23.8 percent  / rank: 4th)

With three goals on nine power play opportunities, the Caps had their first week with a power play over 20 percent since Week 8.  Alex Ovechkin had two of the power play goals on a total of five power play shots.  Troy Brouwer had the other man advantage goal on three shots for the week.  Overall, the Caps shot to a 20.0 percent rate (3-for-15) in 14:50 of total power play time.

It is that time on the power play that reflected a different issue – opportunities.  Nine opportunities in four games is a low participation rate.  It is part of a season-long issue; the Caps finished the week with the sixth-fewest number of power play opportunities per game (2.98).

Here is your odd power play fact for the week.  Each of the three goals the Caps scored for the week represented the game’s first goal.  Two of them were scored in the first two minutes of the game – 1:16 into the 4-3 win over Florida by Ovechkin, and 1:53 into the 3-1 win over Detroit.  The other was scored barely three minutes into the contest (3:08), by Ovechkin in the 3-2 overtime loss to Philadelphia.  

Penalty Kill: 12-for-13 / 92.3 percent (season: 79.4 percent / rank: 22nd)

Week 14 was the best week in penalty killing for the Caps since they snuffed out all five power plays by opponents in Week 7.  Week 7 also happened to be the last week this season that the Caps finished a week over 80.0 percent in penalty killing for the season (they are now at 79.4 percent).

It was an extremely efficient week for the Caps.  Twice they held an opponent without a power play shot – Toronto (in 4:00 of two power plays) and Detroit (in 4:00 of two power plays).  They held Florida without a goal on seven shots in 9:13 of power play time, and even in the one game in which they allowed a power play goal, the Caps did not do so at 4-on-5 (Philadelphia scored the overtime winner at 4-on-3).  For the week, the Caps allowed just one goal on 17 shots in 23:30 of shorthanded ice time.  That is the kind of efficiency one would hope for on a week-to-week basis.

Even Strength Goals for/Goals Against: 11-8 / plus-3 (season, 5-on-5 goals for/goals against ratio: 1.11 / rank: 8th)

Shoring up the 5-on-5 play has been a season-long project for the Caps and their coaching staff.  Last season it was among the weakest parts of their game (0.90 goals-for to goals-against ratio/23^rd in the league).  This season it is among their strongest.  This week the Caps went plus-3 and won the even strength battle in each of their wins (they were minus-1 against the Flyers).

The improvement has been at both ends of the ice.  Goals for at 5-on-5 have increased from 1.69/game last season to 1.95 so far this season, while goals against have dropped from 1.89/game in 2013-2014 to 1.75/game through 41 games so far this season.

Faceoffs: 120-for-251 / 47.8 percent (season: 50.3 percent / rank: 13th)

The week started well for the Caps in the faceoff circle, but the air went out of that balloon quickly.  After winning 43 of 72 draws against Florida to open the week, Washington went 77-for-179 over the last three games of the week (43.0 percent) to finish the week under 50 percent. 

The Caps won the offensive zone for the week (53.8 percent) but were under 50 percent in the other two zones.  On an individual basis, Troy Brouwer had a good week (69.6 percent on 23 draws), as did Jay Beagle (53.1 percent on 32 faceoffs).  The other three Caps taking more than 20 draws for the week – Nicklas Backstrom (48.7 percent of 76 draws), Eric Fehr (37.7 percent on 61 faceoffs), and Evgeny Kuznetsov (46.4 percent on 28 faceoffs) – had less than stellar weeks.

Backstrom and Fehr had especially strange weeks.  The former was 29-for-54 in the defensive and neutral zones (53.7 percent), but won just eight of 22 draws in the offensive end (36.4 percent).  Fehr also was out of profile for the week in the offensive end, but in a different way.  He won 11 of 17 draws in the offensive zone (64.7 percent), but won just 12 of 44 faceoffs in the neutral and defensive zones (27.3 percent).

Goals by Period:

The Caps won every regulation period for the week, 3-1 in the first period of games, 8-5 in the second period, and 4-2 in the third period.  The three first period goals all represented the first goal of those respective games, and the Caps took a lead against Florida in the second period to make it a 4-for-4 week scoring the first goal.  That kind of early production left the Caps in second place at the end of the week in winning percentage when scoring first in games (21-1-3/.840, second to Montreal’s .889).  The Capitals finished Week 14 with Nashville as the only teams in the league with a greater than plus-5 goal differential in each of the three regulation periods for the season.

In the end…

The hits just keep coming for the Caps.  And, the contributions are coming from a variety of places.  Braden Holtby continues to be the rock in goal, but at the other end of the ice the Caps have had game-winning goals from seven different players in their last seven wins.  This week it was Andre Burakovsky, Brooks Laich, and John Carlson doing the honors.  They are doing it with offense – 3.43 goals per game over their last seven games.  They are doing it with defense – not allowing more than three goals in regulation over those same seven games and holding opponents to two or fewer goals regulation in five of those games.

One would have to look rather closely (and we are sure the coaches are doing just that) to find many flaws in the Caps’ game at the moment.  Unfortunately for the team, though, their 12-1-4 record since December 4^th has been more than matched by the New York Rangers’ 13-2-0 over that same span of days.  It means that despite winning almost 83 percent of the available standings points over the last six weeks, the Caps have made up no ground on the Blueshirts in their battle for third place in the Metropolitan Division.  What the teams have done, though, is bootstrap one another so that both are bearing down on Pittsburgh and the Islanders at the top of the division.  At the moment, it is now a four team race in the middle of which the Caps squarely find themselves.

Three Stars:

• First Star: Eric Fehr (2-3-5, plus-5, shorthanded goal)
• Second Star: Braden Holtby (2.25 / .928, set team record for consecutive appearances, tied for seventh in wins, ninth in save percentage)
• Third Star: Alex Ovechkin (3-1-4, goals in three games, finished the week tied for fifth in goals)

A TWO-point night -- Game 41: Capitals 3 - Red Wings 1

The Washington Capitals made it standings points earned in 16 of their last 17 games with a 3-1 win over the Detroit Red Wings at Verizon Center on Saturday night.  The win gave the Caps a 12-1-4 record since December 4^th and allowed them to once more leap-frog the New York Rangers into third place in the Metropolitan Division (pending the Rangers’ late game against the San Jose Sharks).  The win also allowed the Caps to inch within two points of the Red Wings for fifth place in the Eastern Conference.

The Caps got on the board early, taking advantage of Detroit’s Tomas Tatar sending the puck off the rink in the first minute of play.  On the ensuing power play, the Red Wings committed a rare error in their own end that the Caps converted.  When Mike Green backhanded the puck in deep from the Red Wings’ blue line, both defenders back for Detroit – Riley Sheahan and Danny DeKeyser – went to opposite corners as goalie Jimmy Howard circled his net to leave the puck for one of them.  Troy Brouwer jumped up to grab the puck, circled in front, and tucked the puck inside the post before Howard could scramble back.

On the play, Howard tried to extend backward with his left leg to cover the post and crumpled to the ice in serious distress.  Unable to get back to his feet, he was taken from the ice on a stretcher, the late report being that he suffered a groin injury and would be evaluated for the seriousness of the injury.

Petr Mrazek took over in goal for the Wings following the Brouwer goal 1:53 into the game and played admirably.  He did, however, allow another early period goal in the second when John Carlson stepped into a pass left for him as the third man into the Red Wing zone by Andre Burakovsky and blasted a shot past a sliding Mrazek’s glove to make it 2-0, Caps, just 1:35 into the second period.

Joel Ward made it 3-0 mid-way through the period.  Eric Fehr skated into the Detroit zone and laid the puck out for Ward on the left side.  The puck would not settle for Ward, and his first whack at it was a whiff.  He got another whack at it, though, and this time the puck found its way past Mrazek’s blocker to give the Caps a 3-0 lead at the 11:39 mark.

Detroit tried to make a game of it when Jonathan Ericsson scored his first goal of the season with just 11.9 seconds left in the period.  That would be as close as Detroit could get, however, as goalie Braden Holtby made the lead stand up by stopping all 15 shots he faced in the third period for the 3-1 win.

Other stuff…

-- Odd game, to say the least.  Looking at it from a possession standpoint, Detroit won the Corsi battle at even strength.  Trailing by a goal they led in Corsi, 19-6.  Trailing by two goals they led, 23-14.  Trailing by three goals they led, 10-3 (all numbers from war-on-ice.com). 

-- Alex Ovechkin had six shot attempts.  Detroit’s Tomas Tatar had six of his attempts blocked.  It was evidence of a night when the Caps went all “Hollywood Squares” on the Red Wings (“I’ll take Brooks Orpik to block, Peter”).  The Caps had 24 blocked shots, 17 of them credited to the defense.  Orpik had six blocks, and John Carlson had five to lead the club.

-- The Caps had only 17 shots on goal, a season low.  It was their lowest shot total in a win since beating the New York Rangers on 17 shots, 4-1, in the last game of the 2011-2012 regular season.  The last time the Caps won with fewer shots on goal was on January 18, 2012, a 3-0 win over Montreal on 16 shots.

-- The streak of games to start the season without a penalty ended for Marcus Johansson at 40.  In this, his 41^st game of the season, Johansson was sent off for delay of game at 2:09 of the second period. For his first penalty of the season.  It was his first penalty since February 4^th of last season when he took a high sticking penalty in the third period of a 1-0 loss to the New York Islanders.  It broke a streak of 1,042:04 of ice time for Johansson without serving a penalty.

-- Ovechkin’s goals-scored streak ended at five games.  Meanwhile, with an assist, Eric Fehr made it points in six of seven games (6-3-9).

-- Fehr is not going to want his performance in the faceoff circle to go in the scrapbook.  He was just 2-for-15 on draws.

-- Nicklas Backstrom had an assist.  By itself, that might not seem like much.  However, it is just one more example of Backstrom being among the most consistent players of his era.  In 536 career games he now has 535 career points.  And, as for this season, you can see graphically just how he has settled into that point-per-game consistency in 41 games played over the course of the season…

-- The Caps allowed the Red Wings only two power plays and did not allow a shot on goal on either of them.  That’s how to kill penalties.  Don’t take too many, and shut teams down on the few you do take.

-- At evens, though… The Caps had only 12 shots on goal – three in the first period, four in the second, and five in the third.

-- Andre Burakovsky earned the primary assist on the John Carlson goal with a nice assist, finding the trailer as Nicklas Backstrom was charging to the net.  It was Burakovsky’s first assist in almost two months.  His last helper came on November 11^th as part of a two-assist effort in a 4-2 win over Columbus.  The assist broke a 16-game streak without one for the rookie.

In the end…

There is a difference between the commonplace and the expected.  Winning is never the former, but the Caps are playing now as if winning is the latter each time they take the ice.  Even on those nights when they are not sharp, and they were not especially sharp on Saturday night against a team forced to use its backup goaltender as an in-game replacement, they can grind out wins.  The formula is becoming familiar.  Get a lead (the Caps are now 21-1-3 when scoring first), and choke off teams late (they are now 19-1-2 when leading after two periods). 

The Caps are also getting good efforts from a variety of players.  Look at it this way.  In the Caps last seven wins, the game winning goal was scored by seven different players, none of them Alex Ovechkin (Mike Green, Nicklas Backstrom, Eric Fehr, Troy Brouwer, Andre Burakovsky, Brooks Laich, and John Carlson).  It is the kind of consistency and variety that can make for an extended run of success, as opponents of the Caps are finding out these days.

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Game 41: Red Wings at Capitals, January 10th

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

The Washington Capitals bring the first half of the 2014-2015 season to a close on Saturday night when they host the Detroit Red Wings at Verizon Center.

The three-game home stand that starts with Saturday’s contest against the Red Wings is something of transitional phase of the schedule.  Having concluded a successful run against primarily Eastern Conference teams on their way to an 11-1-4 record since December 4^th, the Caps face Detroit, Colorado, and Philadelphia – three capable teams that will provide a test for the Caps – before Washington embarks on a treacherous part of their schedule that will see them facing Nashville, Dallas, Pittsburgh, and Montreal before the end of the month, all of those games on the road except that against the Penguins.  Throw in the fact that the Caps will play five back-to-back sets of games over the next month, and it is apparent that this three-game home stand represents a chance for the Caps to make hay while the sun shines, or to take advantage of home cooking, or [insert appropriate metaphor here].

The first task at hand is to subdue the Red Wings. For a while in mid-December it looked as if the Red Wings’ season was unraveling a bit.  From December 10^th through December 21^st Detroit lost six in a row (0-2-4, all of the extra-time losses coming in the Gimmick) much of it a product of doing without goalie Jimmy Howard, who was out of action with a lower-body injury.  Since then, however, they are 5-2-0 and have climbed within three points of Atlantic Division-leading Tampa Bay with a game in hand.

Over their recent 5-2-0 run, the Red Wings are led in points by Gustav Nyquist.  Thought of primarily as a goal scorer (43 goals in 98 games over this season and last), he has been showing off his helper chops with eight assists to go with one goal.  He has points in five of those seven games, including a three-assist game in a 6-3 win over Buffalo that started the Red Wings’ recent good fortune.  The odd thing about his point production over these seven games?  He is a minus-1, having been on ice for six of the 19 goals allowed by the Red Wings over those seven games (two of them were empty netters).  In four career games against the Caps, Nyquist has five goals and two assists.

Five years ago, it was Nicklas Lidstrom as the dean of Detroit defensemen, one of four natives of Sweden finding playing time on the Red Wings’ blue line.  Today, Niklas Kronwall, one of that group of Swedes, has assumed the role of dean of the Detroit defense.  The 33-year old native of Stockholm, now in his 11^th season in Detroit, has been a very consistent defenseman in terms of his production, much like Lidstrom.  He has averaged half a point per game over his career, and this year he is a bit better, averaging 0.56 points per game (5-18-23 in 41 games to date).  He comes into this game with points in four of his last six contests (0-6-6), but he has not recorded a goal in his last ten games, one in his last 17 contests.  What he has not done recently is get pucks all the way to the net.  Kronwall has five shots on goal in his last nine games after recording 15 over a five-game span ending December 16^th.  In 11 career games against the Caps, Kronwall is 1-4-5, minus-5.

Jimmy Howard has 16 of Detroit’s 22 wins, and his absence after he left the ice after the first period of a December 19^th game against the New York Islanders threw sand into the gears of the Red Wing machine.  Petr Mrazek performed well in Howard’s absence in that game and the two that followed, but the fact remains that it is Howard who dominates the team's statistics at the position and who ranks highly in the league rankings – 4^th in goals against average (2.08) and tenth in save percentage (.921).  His 1,846 minutes ranks tenth among goalies in ice time.  One thing that has eluded him is success against Washington.  He is 3-1-2, 3.23, .880 in six career appearances against the Capitals.

Here is how the teams compare overall:

1.  The Red Wings are a team that seems to get better as games go on.  They are tied for 17^th in first period goals (32), but rank 7^th in third period goals (42).

2.  Scoring first  seems not to be a very good predictor of Red Wings’ success.  Twenty times in 41 games this season Detroit has scored first.  Their .500 winning percentage (10-4-6) ranks 27^th in the league.  On the other hand, their .571 winning percentage when scored upon first (12-6-3) is second in the league.

3.  Detroit plays well in comfort.  In game decided by more than one goal, the Red Wings are 13-7.  However, in one-goal games, their winning percentage of .429 (9-3-9) ranks 22^nd.

4.  The Red Wings have long had a reputation of getting it done without having to resort to the dark arts.  Things have not changed.  Detroit ranks last in the league in fighting majors.  Only two Red Wings have engaged in fisticuffs this season, Kyle Quincey and Brendan Smith, the latter being sent off twice for fighting.

5.  Detroit has the best special teams index in the league.  Their 24.5 percent power play (second in the league) and 86.8 percent penalty kill (fourth) combine for an index of 111.3, almost two full points better than Pittsburgh (109.4).

1.  The Caps have had trouble finding that elusive fourth straight win this season (they have four three-game winning streaks).  They do, however, have a four-game winning streak at home, their longest such streak of the season.  After going 4-4-3 in their first 13 home games, the Caps are 5-1-1 in their last seven home contests.

2.  Intermissions are a good indicator of what Capital outcomes might be. Their 11-1-1 record when leading after one period is the sixth-best winning percentage in the league (.846), while their 18-1-2 record reflects the second highest win total.

3.  That one-goal game record for Detroit of which we spoke?  Yes, the Red Wings rank 22^nd in one-goal game winning percentage.  The team right behind them in the rankings is Washington (10-6-8/.417).

4.  Of the 22 skaters appearing for the Caps this season, only two are in “minus” territory (Jason Chimera: minus-1, and Tom Wilson: minus-2).  Last season, 19 of 35 skaters finished underwater in plus-minus.  At the other end, three Caps have a plus-minus of plus-10 or better this season: John Carlson (plus-14), Eric Fehr (plus-12), and Alex Ovechkin (plus-10).

5.  Three players in the NHL have played in at least 40 games and have yet to record a penalty minute: Anaheim’s Cam Fowler (in 41 games), Calgary’s Johnny Gaudreau (in 41 games), and Washington’s Marcus Johansson (in 40 games).  Since the 2010-2011 season, no player appearing in more than 200 games has fewer penalty minutes than Johansson (26 PIMs in 303 games).

The Peerless’ Players to Ponder

Detroit: Pavel Datsyuk

Pavel Datsyuk just does not seem to age.  Perhaps the only concession he has made to the advance of time is a susceptibility to injury (he has played in only 75 of the Wings’ 123 games over the past two seasons).  However, Datsyuk, with a career points-per-game average of 0.98, is averaging a point a game this season (30 in 30 contests).  What is standing out is his goal-scoring.  His 14 goals in 30 games is, so far, his best goals-per-game production (0.47) in his 13-year career.  It is a product of his shooting percentage (17.5) that is his third best in his career and his best since converting on 19.3 percent of his shots in 2005-2006.  He comes into this game with points in six of his last eight games (2-5-7).  In 14 career games against Washington, Datsyuk is 5-13-18, plus-4.

Washington: Joel Ward

Joel Ward started the season with a hot streak – seven goals in his first 13 games.  Then he went three games before scoring again, four games without one, eight games without one, then nine games, a  streak he would like not to reach ten as the Caps take on the Red Wings.  It has not been for lack of shooting.  Ward has one goal in his last 18 games, but on a total of 30 shots, a 3.3 percent shooting percentage.  Last season Ward finished seventh in the league in shooting percentage (18.0), and even with his recent slump is shooting 14.1 percent overall this season. In three-plus seasons with the Caps, Ward’s overall shooting percentage is 14.3 percent.  Perhaps he’s just shooting in bad luck at the moment.  In 24 games against the Red Wings, Ward has a career scoring line of 10-7-17, plus-7.

In the end…

Playing Detroit is like playing the Yankees in baseball.  They are a standard against which every team measures themselves.  This will be no different for the Caps.  Making it a more important game is that a win in regulation time moves the Caps within a point of the Red Wings for fifth in the Eastern Conference with a game in hand.  This will be the fourth of a six-game road trip on which the Red Wings find themselves, and they come into this contest having won their last two games, the Alberta portion of the journey (4-2 over Edmonton, 3-2 over Calgary).  This is something of a trap game for the Red Wings, it being the only contest Detroit will play over a six-day period. 

The Caps have done well against the Red Wings recently.  Coming into this season Washington had not lost in regulation time to Detroit since dropping a 3-2 decision at Joe Louis Arena in March 2011.  They had not lost at home to the Red Wings in any fashion since losing a 4-3 decision in December 2005.  However, the Red Wings did win the first meeting of these clubs this season, a 4-2 decision at Verizon Center on October 29^th.  It is time the Caps returned the favor.

Capitals 4 – Red Wings 2

A ONE-point night -- Game 40: Flyers 3 - Capitals 2 (OT)

For 39 seasons, the number “four” has been one that caused problems for the Washington Capitals, but that was generally a playoff thing, not being able to win four games in a series very often.  In this, their 40^th anniversary season, they won three straight games in the regular season four times going into their contest last night against the Philadelphia Flyers.  The Caps were looking for a fourth straight win for the first time this season. 

They did not get it.  The Flyers took the Caps to overtime, then won it on a Jakub Voracek power play goal to send the Caps to their first defeat in 2015.  The Caps started on the right foot in the fourth minute of the game on a power play of their own. Alex Ovechkin took advantage of a weak Flyer penalty killing unit (third-worst in the league going into the game) to ring a one-timer off the pipe behind goalie Steve Mason.

The Flyers tied it mid-way through the first period on a Sean Couturier goal.  The game remained tied into the third period, but Karl Alzner broke the deadlock at the 3:08 mark when his long drive from the left point through a screen floated past the right shoulder of Mason.  Just over a minute later, R.J. Umberger tied the game a second time.  Off a faceoff win in the Caps’ zone, Nick Schultz fired a shot that caromed hard off the end boards and seemed to surprise goalie Braden Holtby, who whiffed on an attempt to paddle the rebound aside.  The puck slid out to the slot where Umberger was lurking, and he slammed the rebound home to make the score 2-2.

That would be all the scoring in regulation.  After Matt Niskanen was sent off for a hooking penalty 1:11 into the overtime session, Voracek ended the contest when, after directing traffic on the Flyer power play, slid up to the top of the slot and fired a one-timer that beat Holtby and denied the Capitals a fourth straight win.

Other stuff…

-- This was the first time that the Flyers won the first game in a season series against the Caps since the 2009-2010 season, when Philadelphia took a 6-5 overtime decision in the third game of the season for Washington.

-- Alex Ovechkin made it five straight games with a goal, his longest streak since he scored in five straight games, March 17-24, 2013.  Ovechkin now has 21 goals, tied for fourth in the league.

-- Mike Green had his sixth two-assist game of the season and his fourth in his last ten games.

-- Nate Schmidt saw his first action since December 23^rd.  He skated 12:27 and had three shots on goal along with four hits.

-- This was just the fourth time in 24 games in which the Caps scored first that they lost, the third time they lost in overtime.  They still have the second-best winning percentage in games in which they score first (.833/20-1-3).

-- The Caps are 11-1-4 in their last 16 games.  Of the four extra time losses, three have come in overtime, all of them while skating shorthanded.  Of the Capitals’ five overtime losses this season, four of them have come while shorthanded.

-- The frustrating thing (well, one of them) about the way the game ended was that in regulation the Caps held the Flyers off the board on all nine power play shots they took in six minutes of three power plays.  The Flyers scored on their only shot of the overtime power play.

-- Braden Holtby is now the franchise leader in consecutive games played with his 23rd consecutive appearance. 

-- Karl Alzner scored a goal on his only shot on goal of the game.  That means he has two goals on his last three shots taken dating back to his second period goal in the Caps’ 4-3 win over Florida on Sunday.  His four goals for the year equal his output of his previous three seasons combined.

--  The Caps were bested in shot attempts for the game, allowing the Flyers 71 attempts while getting off only 57 of their own.  The Flyers were also credited with more hits (36-24) and won the faceoff battle (34 of 64 draws).  It was evidence of a team that just wan not quite all there in the back half of a back-to-back set of games.

In the end…

The Caps have a very good record over their last 16 games, as we noted above, but they have left four standings points on the table in frustrating ways – three overtime losses while skating shorthanded and a 20-round Gimmick loss.  Those four points could very well loom large when the calendar rolls over into April.  With this loss the Caps slipped behind the New York Rangers once more for third place in the Metropolitan Division and into seventh place in the conference.

At the moment those four points left on the table are the difference between battling the Rangers for third place in the division and fighting for a wild card playoff spot, and being tied with Pittsburgh and Montreal for second most standings points in the Eastern Conference, two points behind Tampa Bay for the top spot.  They could take on even more importance when the Caps’ schedule stiffens in the second half of the month.  They have done well.  They need to do better.