That Was The Week That Was: November 28 - December 4, By the Tens

A full slate of games last week, so how did it fare?

Record for the week: 2-2-0

The week started well enough with wins over Carolina and St. Louis, but ended with a thud with losses to Dallas and Atlanta. This is a little more than stubbing one’s toe; the Caps are in a bit of a valley. Since putting together a six-game winning streak to push them to the front of the NHL standings they are 6-4-2 in their last dozen games.  Buried within that was a four-game winning streak, but otherwise it looked like a club already hitting something of a wall of indifference.


Offense: 2.00/game

Seven goals in four games when the net was defended by a goaltender (the Caps had an empty netter in the 4-1 win at St. Louis on Wednesday). A very dry week on the offensive side of the ledger. It is not as if the Caps have lacked for shots on goal. They recorded 150 shots in the four games this week. Of three four-game weeks played so far this season, the eight total goals scored is the low total, despite two of the three games so far this season when the Caps recorded at least 40 shots in a game. The best that can be said for the week is that the Caps spread things around. Seven players shared the eight goals (only Nicklas Backstrom had more than one goal), and 13 different players had points.

Defense: 2.00/game

The other side of the coin, and likely a point that will be lost in all the hair pulling over two losses this week, is that the Caps had a very good week defending their own net. The three goals Atlanta scored last night was the worst outing of the week, and the Caps held opponents to a 6.7 percent shooting percentage. In fact, since the Caps took one in the teeth in a 5-0 loss to New Jersey on November 22nd, the Caps have allowed only 10 goals in six games.


Goaltending: 1.99 GAA /.939 SV

No problems with the goaltending this week. If the most that Semyon Varlamov and/or Michal Neuvirth allow is one three-goal game in every four played (those three goals allowed by Varlamov last night), the Caps will be just fine. And, Varlamov and Neuvirth held their opponents without a goal on 36 shots in the first period of the four games for the week. They gave their teammates a chance to take control of games. They did allow a combined three third period goals, but coming as they did on a total of 47 shots (.936 save percentage), it was not a bad week in that regard.

Power Play: 2-11 (18.2 percent)

Not a bad week, but not overwhelming, either. It is the 11 opportunities that is once more disappointing. The encouraging part was that the goals were scored by Brooks Laich and Mike Knuble, guys who are depended upon to create some havoc on the power play. The disappointing parts are: a) the Caps went 2-for-29 on power play shots for the week (0-for-15 against Atlanta), and b) that Alex Ovechkin was 0-for-4 on power play shots and didn’t have any power play shots on goal in two of the games this week.

Penalty Killing: 13-15 (86.7 percent)

One would have trouble finding fault with the penalty killers this week. It is part of a consistently solid – and improving – part of the Caps’ game. The Caps are now eighth in the league in penalty killing. This should not be overlooked. The Caps have not ranked higher in penalty killing in any season since finishing the 1999-2000 season seventh. In fact, in the nine seasons since that seventh overall finish, only twice have the Caps ranked higher than 23rd.


Paying the Price: 103 hits/ 60 blocked shots

The Caps won both games in which they outhit their opponents this week. Ditto on blocked shots. It says something about “paying a price,” perhaps. And given that the Caps played a team that ranks ahead of it in hits (Dallas) and one that ranks ahead of it in blocked shots (Atlanta), it wasn’t necessarily a bad week on that score. But the Caps were held even with Dallas in hits (33 apiece) and were topped in blocked shots (20 to 4) by Atlanta, so maybe it wasn’t as good a week as it might have been.

Faceoffs: 119-225 (52.9 percent)

The Caps won three of the four games in this measure. But embedded in the result is the fact that the Caps were only 40-for-84 in the offensive zone for the week and only split the week in the defensive zone. The highest ranked team they faced this week was Atlanta (19th), and no team was a 50 percent team, so the week was a bit disappointing in the circle.


Turnovers: Plus-1

Not much to see here. The Caps were 1-1 in games in which they won the turnover battle (win over St. Louis, loss to Atlanta), 1-1 in games in which they lost the turnover battle (win over Carolina, loss to Dallas). For the season the Caps are firmly settled in the middle of the pack in takeaways-minus-giveaways (14th at minus-25). The odd thing is that of the six teams in the Eastern Conference ranked ahead of them, four are in the top-eight (playoff) mix, but two of those teams are on the minus side, too (Philadelphia and Boston).

Impressions:

It wasn’t the best of weeks, it wasn’t the worst of weeks. The lasting impressions are those left most recently, though, and that means the two losses. The first thing that comes to mind is the two goals on 84 shots, only one goal on 62 even strength shots. And what comes to mind is that “quantity does not equal ‘quality.’” Specifically in the last game of the week, against Atlanta, the Caps didn’t have much quality in the 46 shots sent Ondrej Pavelec’ way. Even though paying a price might be measured in a team’s collective willingness to inflict punishment (hits) and take it (blocking shots), part of it is also a product of going into high traffic areas to make one’s own opportunities to score. That was not evident at the end of the week. The upcoming week offers something of a weaker challenge, with Toronto and Florida on the bill. But still, this past week had the feeling of a test offered and not passed. A similar test will present itself in the week after this, with the Rangers, Anaheim, and Boston on the schedule, but let’s get one week of good play back under their belts before considering that.

Anatomy of a Shooting

Sometimes 46 shots is indicative of one team dominating another at the opponent’s end of the ice. And then there are games like last night. The Caps registered 46 shots on goal against the Atlanta Thrashers, managing a single goal among those 46 shots. It was not as dominating an effort as you might think, and here are a few reasons why…

Distance:

Of the Caps’ 46 shots on goal last night, only 13 of them came from inside of 20 feet. Only two of those 13 shots from inside 20 feet came on the power play. With fewer Thrashers on the ice, one might have thought there would be more room to get shots from close-in scoring areas. Eric Fehr had four of those 13 total shots, Brooks Laich another three (two of them on the power play). The top line? One (Nicklas Backstrom).

On the other end, 22 shots were taken from outside of 30 feet. You might expect the defensemen to take the majority of such shots, but only eight came from the sticks of blueliners. Alex Ovechkin had five of his total of six shots in this distance category, two of them from more than 45 feet.

Frequency:

If you take 46 shots over a 60 minute game, you are averaging a shot every 1:18. It seemed the Caps were trying to flirt with that kind of frequency last night, meaning that they were not peppering goaltending Ondrej Pavelec with rapid-fire volleys that would require him to make saves in quick succession. Only twice all evening did the Caps record consecutive shots less than ten seconds apart without an intervening face off, one coming midway through the first period when Mike Green and Brooks Laich recorded shots at 9:55 and 9:57, the other on a power play in the second period when Alex Ovechkin and Jason Chimera recorded shots at 4:14 and 4:22.

It is worth noting that the Caps did not record a shot over a 5:36 period in the second period, their longest drought of the game. It was during that span that Atlanta scored their first two goals to put the Caps in a hole.


Special Teams:

The Caps had 15 shots on goal on the power play, failing to convert on any of them. Small wonder why when one looks at the distances and frequency here. First, of the 15 power play shots, only two came from inside of 20 feet. The Caps were not crowding Pavelec’s crease well enough to get rebound shots.

Then there was the frequency. The Caps had five power plays, and here is how the shots fell out in terms of game time

PP1: 9:55/9:57/10:41/10:53
PP2: 3:07/4:04/4:10 (after faceoff)/4:14 (after faceoff)/4:22
PP3: 11:54/12:32/12:53
PP4: 9:00/9:12
PP5: 12:12

Lots of shots, but not much in terms of "pressure" -- making Pavelec make saves on shots in quick succession.

Who and Where:

It is one thing for defensemen to take shots from the outside; it is the nature of the position. But Mike Green (average shot distance: 38.8 feet) taking shots from closer in than Alex Ovechkin (45.0 feet)? Or Nicklas Backstrom (47.0 feet)? Neither Ovechkin nor Backstrom are generally thought of as the kind of offensive player who spends a lot of time trafficking in the close-in regions, but this seems to us more than a bit outside their comfort range for scoring. Even Brooks Laich (32.0 feet), Mike Knuble (31.0 feet), and Alexander Semin (29.0 feet) provided more evidence that the forwards were not doing much of their work on the inside, although Laich’s number is skewed by getting credit for a 91-foot shot.

This little look does not include misses or blocks, but what it seems to indicate to us is that the Caps were more or less suckered into taking long shots that Pavelec was given an opportunity to see because Caps who might have been in close were getting tied up by Thrasher defenders and were not getting rebound chances. Or, the Caps just didn’t make much of a game of it in close. Either way, sometimes 46 shots seems like 46 shots.

And sometimes, they seem like just so much cotton candy.

A NO-point night -- Game 28: Thrashers 3 - Caps 1

When the week started, the Caps faced the prospect of going up against a goaltender capable of making their lives difficult. It turns out that the goaltender in question wasn’t in St. Louis but right under their own noses in Verizon Center. The Caps pumped 46 shots at Ondrej Pav-halak… uh, Pavelec… and managed to get only one behind him as the Atlanta Thrashers gave the Caps their second loss at home in regulation this season in a 3-1 decision.

The 45-save performance by Pavelec made the performance at the other end by Semyon Varlamov for the Caps seem downright ordinary, but Varlamov probably faced as many quality scoring opportunities in the 33 shots he faced that Pavelec faced in the 46 shots he saw. The difference was consistency. Whereas Pavelec made saves both big and small, Varlamov and the Caps might have been undone by a relatively simple play midway through the second period.

After Rich Peverley redirected a Dustin Byfuglien drive over Varlamov’s left shoulder for the first goal of the game – a goal that Varlamov had little chance to stop – Ben Eager won a battle along the wall for a loose puck (we’ll come back to this idea later). He poked the biscuit out to Nik Antropov at the top of the left wing circle, whereupon Antropov sent the puck deep to Alexander Burmistrov in the left wing corner. Burmistrov walked the goal line, Varlamov hugging the near post as he did so. As Burmistrov closed, it looked for just a split second that Varlamov cheated in anticipation of Burmistrov pulling the puck in front for a deke. It left just enough of an opening above Varlamov’s right shoulder, and Burmistrov picked it, flipping the puck high to the short side and just inside the post to stake the Thrashers to a two-goal lead. With the way Pavelec was playing, you had the feeling it would be enough. Even with Alex Ovechkin breaking his nine-game streak without a goal, it was.

Other stuff…

-- The game began with 8:50 of play that was uninterrupted by any whistle. It seemed to go by in a blink.

-- One strange moment in a hockey game… Atlanta on a power play, and Brooks Laich tying up four Thrashers behind their own net and playing keep-away with the puck.

-- It was one of the few moments in which the Caps competed successfully along the boards. All night long it looked to be a case that whenever a Cap and a Thrasher contested along the wall for a puck, the Thrasher would win the battle. It was indicative of a game in which the Thrashers were much more successful in playing the game they wanted than the Caps were in playing theirs.

-- Part of that game the Thrashers played made the 46 shots on goal very deceiving. And here is an example of how… Mike Knuble had three shots on goal all night. Given the nature of Knuble’s game and the total number of shots, you might have expected that he would have had opportunities to whack away from in close. In fact, his shots came from 26, 39, and 28 feet, according to the official play-by-play. Nothing in-close there. Atlanta was content to let the Caps wail away from far out and to tie up anyone in close to prevent rebound shots. Brooks Laich and Eric Fehr – two other players counted on to get opportunities from in-close – had some more success in getting those shots, but not much.

-- The Caps had 15 shots on the power play, nine of them from the sticks of Alex Ovechkin, Alexander Semin, and Mike Green. How many times in a season will you see that many power play shots, that many power play shots from the right guys, and none of them go in? Well, against goaltenders not named “Halak” in a playoff series, anyway…

-- Speaking of Mike Green, he’s going to see Pavelec in his sleep for a few nights. He had 12 shot attempts, six shots on goal, and maybe four or five of them being from places Green can be counted on to score.

-- The Caps were credited with 11 hits in the first period. They finished the game with 17. Just an observation.

-- The Caps out-attempted the Thrashers 80-43. That’s like a football team winning the time of possession 40 minutes to 20 and losing 14-10.

-- The Thrashers blocked 20 shots (17 by defensemen), the Caps had four blocked shots. Frankly, we thought the Caps had five (missed one by Boyd Gordon early on), but that is quite a discrepancy.

-- From the “actions have consequences” file… David Steckel skated 10 shifts totaling 6:40 over the first two periods – about normal, even with having taken a roughing penalty (roughing?) in the first period. Then he was whistled for kneeing Tobias Entstrom 2:19 into the third period, after which he was locked up with Jim Slater in an ensuing fight. The Thrashers scored on the power play eight seconds later, ending the momentum the Caps had built late in the second period with dominating puck possession. Steckel’s night was over. He did not see the ice again for the remainder of the game.

-- About the fight. Rule 46.11 says the following:

Instigator - An instigator of an altercation shall be a player who by his actions or demeanor demonstrates any/some of the following criteria: distance traveled; gloves off first; first punch thrown; menacing attitude or posture; verbal instigation or threats; conduct in retaliation to a prior game (or season) incident; obvious retribution for a previous incident in the game or season. A player who is deemed to be the instigator of an altercation shall be assessed an instigating minor penalty, a major penalty for fighting and a ten-minute misconduct.

Jim Slater traveled quite a distance to get at Steckel after the collision with Enstrom. His gloves came off first, he threw the first punch, we’re betting his attitude was “menacing,” it was obviously retribution for a previous incident in the game (that occurring immediately before the fight, albeit to a teammate). If that’s not “instigating,” there is no such penalty in the NHL.

-- The Caps might have had 46 shots to the Thrashers’ 33, but the Thrashers’ shots came from everywhere, or more precisely, everyone. Only two skaters – Niclas Bergfors and Nik Antropov – did not register a shot on goal.

-- Another way in which the 46 shots for the Caps might be deceiving… The Caps won 10 of 22 faceoffs in the offensive end. Not a bad number, but consider that Nicklas Backstrom won only two of 11 draws in the offensive end. Not much ability to run set plays out of that.

-- These teams face each other once more in this regular season – on January 26th in Atlanta – and we wonder if there won’t be some long memories on the part of the Caps. A good number of Caps – Jason Chimera, John Carlson, among others – spent time counting their teeth after taking Thrasher sticks to the face. Atlanta was whistled for two high-sticking calls. It could have been three times that and it still might have been light.

In the end, there is nothing to see here… unless the Caps and the Thrashers were to meet, say, in the first round of the playoffs. There is an uneasy similarity to the way the season series between the Caps and Thrashers is playing out and last year’s season series between Montreal and the Caps. Last season the Caps split four games with the Canadiens (both teams went 2-1-1). It’s true that the Caps did not face Jaroslav Halak in any of the four regular season games last season, but they did face a team that was unintimidated in playing them. This season, Atlanta hasn’t sung from the hymn book this year the verse that the Caps are the gold standard in the Southeast. The Caps have scored only 12 goals in regulation in the five games played against the Thrashers, only one goal in their past two games. You could say it is early in the season, but in some ways – uncomfortable ones – the ground work is being laid for what could be an interesting playoff matchup down the road.

Be warned.

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Caps vs. Thrashers, December 4th

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

The Caps return home tonight after splitting a pair of road games and will find waiting for them the Atlanta Thrashers. If you are a hockey fan with entirely too much time on his or her hands, you know that the Thrashers employ the fifth best general manager in the NHL, in the opinion of the fine folks at that renowned hockey periodical – Forbes Magazine. In naming Don Waddell to their list, Forbes stated…

Among GMs with more than two years on the job, Waddell's average annual payroll ranked next-to-last in the NHL over the past five years. Yet his club won 12 more games than it lost over that span. He was promoted to team president before this season.

We were interested to see what other fifth-place finishers in a variety of categories had said about them. So, in the interest of perspective and context…

Songkick ranks Denver as the fifth top city for rock music in the US, behind such legendary rock and roll havens as Austin,Texas; and Madison, Wisconsin.

San Diego was named as having the fifth best airport in the US by Conde nast magazine, behind… Reagan National? We’ll leave it to you frequent flyers to figure that out.

Money named Bellingham, Washington, the fifth best college town to retire to, behind Prescott, Arizona, home to Yavapai College. No disrespect to the alumni community of Yavapai intended, but the home page for Yavapai features an invitation to become a video game developer. Noble pursuit, that, but we’re not thinking that is what attracts students to, say, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

When it comes to assessing the greatness of a hockey general manager, we are wondering about the methodology used by the Forbes crew and their reliance on payroll as a criterion above, oh, winning. In exploring methodologies to evaluate general managers, we were reminded of one of the great assessers of modern (or ancient, for that matter) institutions. Let us read…

Understanding Hockey General Managing, by Dr. J. Evans Pritchard, Ph.D. To fully understand hockey general managing, we must first be fluent with its salary cap, trade lists, and speed dial files. Then ask two questions: One, how artfully has the objective of the hockey general manager been rendered, and two, how important is that objective. Question one rates the hockey general managing perfection, question two rates its importance. And once these questions have been answered, determining a hockey general manager’s greatness becomes a relatively simple matter.


If the hockey general manager’s score for perfection is plotted along the horizontal of a graph, and its importance is plotted on the vertical, then calculating the total area of the hockey general management yields the measure of its greatness. A trade by Ken Holland may score high on the vertical, but only average on the horizontal. A Glen Sather free agency signing, on the other hand, would score low both horizontally and vertically, yielding a puny total area, thereby revealing the hockey general managing to be truly awful. As you proceed through the hockey general managing examples in this book, practice this rating method. As your ability to evaluate hockey general managers in this matter grows, so will your enjoyment and understanding of hockey general managing.

Makes one want to start a Dead General Managers Society…maybe to honor John Ferguson, Jr.

But for tonight, the object of the exercise is evaluating the Atlanta Thrashers, the team that just won’t go away. The upstart Thrashers reside in third place in the East, perhaps where one might have expected. But they are the poster team for the Southeast flexing its young muscles, sitting in eighth place in the Eastern Conference. Usually by now you might find one Southeast team in third in teh conference (because someone has to be a division leader), another team maybe fighting for a playoff spot, and the other three teams seeing visions of draft lottery in their futures. Not so this year, largely thanks to the Thrashers. Here is how the overall number fall out…

This will be the fifth meeting of the season between these teams. The teams have split the four games played to date, the Thrashers earning an extra standings point for taking the Caps to overtime in the second game of the series, a 4-3 win for Washington. The last time out, though, the Thrashers put up three goals in the first period on their way to pasting the Caps, 5-0.

This has been a home team’s series to date, the Thrashers winning both games at Philips Arena by a combined score of 9-2, and the Caps winning both games at Verizon Center by a combined score of 10-7. As one can see, the home team has generally had a good time on offense.

The status of Evander Kane for tonight’s game is uncertain. That might be the critical question about this game in that while Kane is 9-7-16, minus-7 in 25 games so far this season, he is 5-2-7, plus-3 against the Caps in four games (leaving him 4-5-9, minus-10 in 21 games against the rest of the NHL). Kane is nursing a knee injury suffered when he got in the way of a shot by teammate defenseman Tobias Enstrom last Tuesday in a 3-2 overtime win.

Kane’s status aside, the talk of the town in Atlanta (to the extent the town talks at all about hockey, which, if indicated by Thrasher attendance isn’t much) is Dustin Byfuglien. The big defenseman had a six game points streak ended on Thursday against Pittsburgh, but he is still 5-6-11, plus-6, and two game-winning goals in his last seven games. He has done this after skating only 4:26 in a 2-1 loss to Florida on November 17th when he was struck by a dump-in and could not return. So far this season, though, Byfuglien is “only” 1-0-1, plus 1 in four games against the Caps. But he also has a total of five game-winning goals among the ten recorded so far this season overall.

Under the radar has been Andrew Ladd for the Thrashers. He is second on the club in scoring (8-17-25) and is second on the club in scoring against the Caps this season (3-2-5 in four games so far). The last time these teams met Ladd started what would be a four-game points streak. He had an assist in the 5-0 win on November 19th. But he has cooled a bit, recording a single assist in his last three games.

Ondrej Pavelec has appeared in 14 consecutive games for Atlanta. He also has appeared in three of the four games of the season series in Washington. Since his unfortunate fainting incident in the season opener, Pavelec is 1-1 against the Caps, 0.60, .978, and that 5-0 shutout. In those 13 consecutive appearances Pavelec has a 7-5-1 record, but he also has a 1.67 GAA and a .947 save percentage with two shutouts to go with it. In the 12 games in this streak in which he played the entirety of the contest he allowed more than two goals only three times.

The Peerless’ Players to Ponder:

Atlanta: Brent Sopel

Who? Well, Sopel leads the Thrashers in shorthanded ice time, and the Thrashers will be facing the league’s second best power play, one that is 19-for-55 (34.6 percent) over its last 17 games (12-for-31 on home ice – 38.7 percent). Mr. Sopel is hopefully going to be busy defending this power play.

Washington: Alex Ovechkin

Atlanta is the last team against which Ovechkin has scored a goal, the first goal of the game 90 seconds in to a 6-4 win. It was his only shot on goal in that game. Since then, Ovechkin is oh-for-nine games and oh-for-41 shots. He does have nine assists in the ten games since scoring that goal (including one in that 6-4 win over Atlanta in which he scored his last goal). In 40 career games against Atlanta he is 29-33-62, including a goal and two assists in four games this season.

Keys:

1. The frequency of opportunity knocking. These are two of the top power play clubs in the league. The Caps are second in the league, the Thrashers third. The difference is on the other side of the ice – the Caps are the seventh best penalty killing club, while the Thrashers are stuck in a tie for 22nd in the league and 27th in penalty killing on the road. The Caps haven’t had more than four opportunities on the power play since getting seven against the Flyers on November 20th. The Caps scored on three of them. That was seven games ago. If the Caps go north of five power play opportunities tonight, it likely will not be good for the visitors.

2. Make Kanoobie happy. Mike Knuble has four goals this season, one of which came against the Thrashers. His ability to collect the trash from in front, and the ability of his teammates such as Brooks Laich or Eric Fehr or Jason Chimera. Getting those kind of shots might be an important ingredient against a team that is tied for the most shots on goal allowed in the league.


3. Zero-to-60. The Thrashers have the third worst record for allowing first period goals this season, the seventh worst in the third period. The Caps already have third periods covered – they are second in the league in third period goals scored. It’s the first period the Caps need to take advantage of, seeing as how they are tied for 19th in first period goals scored. This would be the team against which they can reverse this.

In the end, Atlanta is still a hot team. Before the loss to Pittsburgh they won six games and allowed more than one goal in only one of those six wins. Even in the loss to Pittsburgh on Thursday they allowed only three (none to players not named “Crosby”). This is not your Kovalchuk’s team. They have good goaltending and solid defense at the moment, despite being tied for 19th in goals allowed per game. The Caps will need all the arrows in their quiver to keep the upstarts from getting a leg up in the season series. Of course, you know we think their aim be true…

Caps 4 – Thrashers 2

Happy Anniversary...Now, How About a Happy Springtime?

Yesterday marked the 13th birthday of the Verizon Center, then called "MCI Center."  Sunday will mark the 13th anniversary of the Washington Capitals' first game there.  In that game, Jeff Toms scored 3:32 into overtime to give the Caps a 3-2 win over the Florida Panthers in the inaugural game at the big house on Fun Street.  It would be the springboard to a 26-20-8 finish that would earn the Caps a playoff berth that they used to earn a trip to the Stanley Cup finals.  And it is here where the Verizon Center showed itself not to be a friend of the Caps in the spring. 

The Caps opened the playoffs in the spring of 1998 with a 3-1 win over the Boston Bruins, signaling that the new arena would give the Caps quite a home-ice advantage.  But starting with that game and that season, and over the 12 years to follow, Verizon Center has been anything but an "advantage" for the Capitals in the playoffs...

-- The Caps have a 14-22 record in Verizon Center in seven playoff seasons.

-- In six of those seven seasons, the Caps would play their last game of the season -- a loss -- on Verizon Center ice.

-- In three of those six seasons, the loss would come in a Game 7 (each of the last three seasons, to the Flyers, Penguins, and Canadiens).

-- In one of those six seasons, the last game would be a three-overtime loss on a power play goal scored by Tampa Bay's Martin St. Louis, the penalty being for the mundane offense of too many men on the ice.  It was one of three losses at home -- two in overtime -- by the Caps to the Lightning in that year.

-- In seven playoff seasons since VC opened, the Caps have never had a winning playoff season at home.  The best they have done is to break even in two seasons -- in 2008 against the Flyers, and in 2009 against the Rangers and Penguins.

-- The Caps have a 2-6 record at Verizon Center in overtime playoff games.  Three times they lost games on power play goals (twice in one series, against Tampa Bay in 2003), and once they lost scoring into their own net on a deflection off a Capitals' stick.

It's nice that the Caps have a 12-1-1 record so far this season in Verizon Center.  It was nice that they had a 30-5-6 record at home last season and a 29-9-3 record there in the season before that, not to mention winning eight of their last ten at home in that big finish to the 2007-2008 season.  But when the trees bloom and the flowers make their way toward the sun in the spring, Verizon Center (or MCI Center, or "The Phone Booth"... whatever you want to call it) has been a house of horrors for the Caps and their fans, especially with three Game 7 losses in the past three years.

Let's hope this year  -- the "lucky 13th" year -- is different.

Happy Anniversary.

A NO-point night -- Game 27: Stars 2 - Caps 1

Last night the Caps lost a 2-1 decision to the Dallas Stars in a game that will be remembered for two sequences lasting a combined 30 seconds more than will the other 59:30 of the game.

The first sequence lasted twenty seconds, the length of time it took for the Caps to tie the game at a goal apiece in the third period, courtesy of a goal from Mike Knuble off a nice feed from Mike Green, to a goal restoring the Dallas lead by Brandon Segal that goalie Michal Neuvirth seemed to lose in the background before he reacted too late to it.

The second sequence came in the last ten seconds of regulation. John Carlson took a shot through traffic, Alex Ovechkin creating the havoc in front of Stars goalie Andrew Raycroft. Ovechkin and defenseman Karlis Skrastins fought for position as Carlson was winding up, and Skrastins ended up piling into his own goaltender. Goal? Well, no. The score was immediately waved off by referee Dan O’Rourke, who whistled Alex Ovechkin for a goaltender interference penalty despite not touching Raycroft. In fact, Raycroft would say later that the only thing he saw was Skrastin’s backside. Did Ovechkin commit a foul despite not being the player to make contact with Raycroft? Well, here is what Rule 69.1 has to say on the subject…

“If a defending player has been pushed, shoved, or fouled by an attacking player so as to cause the defending player to come into contact with his own goalkeeper, such contact shall be deemed contact initiated by the attacking player for purposes of this rule, and if necessary a penalty assessed to the attacking player and if a goal is scored it would be disallowed.”

How you stand on Ovechkin’s situation depends on how you interpret the verbs, “pushed, shoved, or fouled.” Skrastins was not fouled (no penalty was called on Ovechkin for interference or any other contact penalty on Skrastins). As for the matter of “pushed” or “shoved,” this didn’t seem to us a “Hal Gill” instance, when Ovechkin deposited Gill in the lap of the Montreal goaltender in a game against the Canadiens last year. This was two guys fighting for position, and it seems Ovechkin was penalized for being stronger than Skrastins in fighting for that position.

Other stuff…

-- Andrew Raycroft brought a 5-3-1, 2.16, one shutout record in his career against the Caps into this game. Good call by coach Marc Crawford to play him. He stopped 37 of 39 shots in the win…oops, 37 of 38.

-- Another game, another power play goal. The Caps were 1-for-3 last night.

-- Eric Fehr had 13 shot attempts (in only 12 minutes and change of ice time), four of them on goal, those four shots coming from an average of about 20 feet from the net. It was among the more animated games Fehr has played recently.

-- Jeff Schultz led the Caps in hits?! That thud you just heard was the Schultz Haters Society fainting.

-- Sometimes, you know? The shots just don’t go in. The Caps launched 82 shot attempts at the Stars’ net (39 getting to or past Raycroft…oops, 38). They had more misses (22) and shots blocked (22) than Dallas managed to get on goal (21). Only two Caps didn’t have a shot attempt – Matt Bradley (who played only 6:30, none of it in the last 9:22) and Scott Hannan. Only Bradley, Hannan, John Erskine, and David Steckel did not have at least one shot on goal. Fans can’t say the Caps didn’t shoot the puck.

-- Last spring, Alexander Semin took 44 shots on goal in the playoffs without finding the back of the net. Well, Alex Ovechkin is at 41 shots without a goal over nine games and counting.

-- Mike Green had 12 shot attempts last night, four of them on goal. He went without finding the back of the net, too, and his streak without a goal has reached seven games and 19 shots. But he has been on the ice for only six of the 21 goals scored against the Caps in that span – four at even strength – that (given his ice time) is not a large number.

-- Scott Hannan… 19:30 in ice time (4:50 in shorthanded ice time), three hits, four blocked shots (team leader for the night). Not bad, even with the two giveaways.

-- Brandon Segal… a fight and the game-winning goal (on his only shot on what would be his last shift of the game) in only 5:52 of ice time. This ain’t so hard.

In the end, one standings point is not likely to matter in the larger scheme of things for the season. But it is a point the Caps were denied largely because Alex Ovechkin can impose his physical will on most players in this league, including the likes of Karlis Skrastins. It was an iffy call to say the least, although to dismiss it out of hand as clearly a bad call is a little too “home town” a perspective. From our chair, though, it was, because we understand the verbs “push,” “shove,” and “foul” and have yet to see in that sequence how any of them apply.

We’ll take it though, if the Caps can someday get one of these calls on their side. Say, in the Stanley Cup finals.

A TWO-point night -- Game 26: Caps 4 - Blues 1

The Caps churned out a methodical 4-1 win against the St. Louis Blues last night, handing the home team their second straight loss on home ice, their only two such losses in regulation so far this season. The win came with a price, though, as Tom Poti did not answer the bell for the third period. Word is he will be re-evaluated today.

But as for the game, it was the Nick and Varly Show – Nicklas Backstrom providing the offense (two goals and an assist), and Semyon Varlamov stopping 37 of 38 shots for his fourth straight win and fourth straight game in which he allowed two or fewer goals. Varlamov is now 4-1-1, 1.72, .939, and one shutout in five appearances. In the goalie sweepstakes for the Caps, that is called announcing his presence with authority.

Other stuff…

-- Lost in the haze of victory was one act in the dying seconds of the game. Alex Ovechkin was skating up the right side of the ice, and as he was heading through the neutral zone had a yawning empty net to shoot at. He also had Blues closing on him. One might have expected the league’s top goal scorer over the past five years to wrist the puck at the net and likely break his own seven game streak without a goal. Instead, he steered the puck to Nicklas Backstrom heading down the middle. Backstrom redirected the puck into the net for the final tally, and Ovechkin had his 23rd assist, tied for second in the league and tops among wingers. Selfish, indeed.

-- If John Erskine is giving up his regular spot in the lineup to Scott Hannan, he’s going out with a bang…literally. Erskine led the Caps with five hits last night, but more than that he had an assist, two blocked shots, and was plus-2 in more than 15 minutes of ice time. Erskine is one of the unheralded stories so far this season. He has been very steady in his role this season.

-- Brooks Laich got his wish. In the lead up to the game he indicated an indifference to the fact that Caps tormenter Jaroslav Halak was in goal for the Blues, but noted it would still be nice to score a goal on him. He did, getting the Caps off and running in the game’s ninth minute.

-- And if D.J. King couldn’t renew acquaintances with Cam Janssen (who did not dress for the Blues), he had the next best thing – an assist on Boyd Gordon’s first goal of the season, which turned out to be the game-winner.

-- Speaking of Gordon… a goal, a hit, a blocked shot, and 11 faceoff wins in 17 tries. A nice night for 14 minutes of work. And that makes 15 wins in 16 appearances in the lineup. As Boyd goes, so go the Caps.

-- Former Cap Stefan Della Rovere made his NHL debut last night with the Blues and recorded a pair of hits in 6:47 of ice time. He had only two shifts in the third, though, one of those mop-up duty in the last 35 seconds after Backstrom’s empty-net goal.

-- The Caps had a rather dismal night at both ends of the rink on faceoffs – 6-for-17 in the offensive end, and other than Boyd Gordon winning 7-of-11 in the defensive end were 7-for-16.

-- Again, the Caps were quite efficient on the power play (50 percent last night), but they had only two to work with, none after the first period. As for the penalty killers, 4-for-4 makes the Caps perfect in their last three games (12-for-12) and a solid 90.0 percent in their last seven games.

-- Maybe it’s a scoring thing, but only four Caps were not credited with a hit last night (Jeff Schultz, Tom Poti, Brooks Laich, and Alexander Semin).

-- The Caps were out-attempted 65-43 last night. St. Louis had more errant shots (27 misses and blocks) than the Caps had shots on goal (26). Only four Blues players did not record a shot on goal. Not sure what to make of that other than the Caps are a quite efficient offensive team.

-- The Caps had three points from defensemen last night, none of them named “Mike Green.” Tom Poti, John Erskine, and John Carlson had an assist each. Green, in fact, did not record a shot on goal and had only one shot attempt. Green not shooting or getting goals? Ovechkin passing up an open net? What is with these guys?? Are they… growing up?

In the end, the word coming to mind after last night’s game was “workmanlike.” It was not flashy, and the Caps didn’t get caught up in the whole “HALAK!” thing. It was the kind of win good teams grind out on a weeknight in the middle of the season.

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Caps vs. Stars, December 2nd

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

It’s the second half of a back-to-back as the Caps jet to Dallas to take on the Stars in a battle of division leaders, Washington in the Southeast and Dallas in the Pacific. That the Caps lead the Southeast is not a surprise, that the Stars top the Pacific is, considering that the San Jose Sharks are the three-time defending division champion. The Stars have done it be being streaky – three times so far they have cobbled together winning streaks of at least three games, two of them stretching to four, including the streak on which they now find themselves. The overall numbers compare to the Caps as follows:

What Dallas hasn’t been able to do is be “special” in their approach to winning. They rank in the lowest third in the league in both power play and penalty killing. In fact, the Stars had a rather forgettable November in terms of their power play. In 13 games in the month they were 8-for-50 (16.0 percent), but four of those goals came in a single game, a 6-3 win over Phoenix on November 5th. And although the Stars are riding a four-game winning streak, their power play is only 1-for13 along the way.

Their penalty killing has been more effective in November, killing off 42 of 49 shorthanded situations (85.7 percent)., and they have killed off all nine such situations they faced on their four-game winning streak. But where the Stars have been most effective is at 5-on-5, where they rank fifth in goals scored-to-goals allowed ratio.

Caps fans look longingly at Brad Richards as a potential trade-day acquisition to fill the number two center role. Well, as long as the Stars are competing for the Western Conference title (they are second on Wednesday), good luck with those wishes. Richards leads the Stars in scoring (11-17-28) and is a plus-11. He is on a pace to set career highs in goals (39, previous high of 26), points (100), and plus/minus (plus-39). If he finishes on the plus side at all it will be the first time for Richards since the 2003-2004 season when he was plus-14 for the Stanley Cup champion Tampa Bay Lightning. Richards is 9-9-18, plus-2 in his last 16 games. He has had fair success against the Caps, going 4-24-31 in 45 career games against Washington.

Jamie Benn spent the entirety of last season with the Stars, recording 22 goals and 41 points in his rookie season. Then he was shipped to the Texas Stars of the AHL to give them a boost on their road to the AHL Calder Cup finals. In his first 18 games with Texas in the playoffs he was a man among boys, recording 14 goals and ten assists, while going plus-10. In the finals against Hershey he was held to two assists and a minus-3 in a six game series that Hershey won. So far this season he is slightly ahead of last year’s scoring pace with Dallas, going 6-9-15, minus-2 in 20 games so far. He is on a three-game points streak (3-2-5, plus-3), but he was held without a point in his only appearance against Washington to date.

Y’all haven’t forgotten Brian Sutherby entirely, have you? The former Cap (259 games from 2001-2007, 26-35-61, minus-29) has appeared in 17 games so far for the Stars this season with a goal and an assist to show for it. Among players appearing in more than one game this season for Dallas, only Krys Barch has less average ice time than the 7:50 Sutherby is logging. He has had four fights already, though, which leads the team. November was unremarkable for Sutherby, recording no points in nine games for the month. Despite having left the Caps in the 2007-2008 season, he has only one appearance against the Caps since leaving (0-0-0).

Stephane Robidas is one of the underrated defensemen in the NHL. For the Stars, he leads the blueliners in just about every statistical category – goals (two), assists (nine), points (11), plus/minus (plus-8), PIMs (31), average ice time (23:51), and takeaways (11). He has struggled lately, though. In his last 11 games he is 0-3-3, minus-4, and he has no points at even strength (all three assist coming on the power play). Against the Caps he is 2-3-5 in 16 career games.

In goal, Kari Lehtonen has been a workhorse, conditioned, in fact. This will be news to Caps fans who remember the brittle Lehtonen who played for the Atlanta Thrashers and missed large swaths of time due to back issues (perhaps the product of a less than diligent approach to conditioning). He has appeared in 20 of the Stars’ 23 games to date with a 12-7-1, 2.61, .914 record. He has been effective of late – 5-1-1 in his last seven appearances, with a 2.11 goals against average and a .928 save percentage. Lehtonen is 10-6-2, 2.80 in 16 career appearances against the Caps.

The Peerless’ Players to Ponder

Dallas: Brenden Morrow

Brenden Morrow is one of those captains who leads not by putting up big numbers, but by being a heart and soul guy who has a ton of grit and is a pain in the backside to play against. He also happens to be on a pace to match his career high in goals (32, set in 2007-2008). It represents a comeback of sorts after having missed 64 games in 2008-2009 due to a knee injury and returning from that to record only 46 points in 76 games last season. He had a four game dry spell without a point in mid-November, but is 2-4-6, plus-2 in the seven games since. The odd part about his performance this season is that he has been more productive on the road (5-3-8, plus-1, in 11 games) than he has at home (4-3-7, even, in 12 games) He is 5-8-13 in ten career games against the Caps.

Washington: Scott Hannan

First day for the new kid in school. This is the first time in Hannan’s career that he has changed teams in mid-season. He doesn’t lack for experience against the Stars, though. He has played an even 50 games against Dallas in his career and has a 2-5-7 line with 24 PIMS to go along with it. He has already faced Dallas twice this season (0-1-1, plus-2). The thing to watch here is the minutes he gets and the defensemen with whom he is paired. It would be nice to find a quick chemistry, but the new kid often has to ease himself in.

Keys:

1. Be ‘special.” The Caps are a top-ten team in both power play and penalty killing. Dallas is a bottom-ten team in both. It’s not hard to do the math here. The Caps need to outscore the Stars on special teams.

2. Make it seem like home. The Stars are a much better team on special teams at home (12 on the power play, 19th on the penalty kill) than they are on the road. The Caps are a very adept home team on the power play, somewhat less so on the road.

3. Find the “Old Kari.” In his last ten decisions against the Caps, Lehtonen is 4-6-0, 3.11, .919. The Caps have been able to score on him. He might have found his inner Jack LaLanne, but the Caps know the Old Kari might still be in there, too.

In the end, this might be one of those games that the Caps need to exhibit patience to win. Only one team has a better winning percentage in one-goal games than the Stars’ 8-2-1/.727 (Detroit). The flip side of that is that the Caps are tied with the Stars for second in that one-goal game winning percentage. It could be another one-goal game, but perhaps not of the low scoring variety. These teams have combined for at least six goals in each of the last three games they have played against one another, and with Lehtonen’s history against the Caps and perhaps Michal Neuvirth’s return to action after a an 11-day absence it might be more entertaining from an offensive perspective.

Caps 4 – Stars 3

Dealing from Strength, Filling a Need

The Washington Capitals pulled the trigger on a trade yesterday that sent forward Tomas Fleischmann to the Colorado Avalanche for defenseman Scott Hannan. On paper, this is one of those win-win sorts of deals. The Avalanche get a forward who can score – not an insignificant matter for a team that has forwards Peter Mueller and Chris Stewart on injured reserve – and the Caps get the stay-at-home defenseman who can eat minutes that they lacked.

First, Fleischmann. Tomas Fleischmann, if not dealt a bad hand in his tenure with the Caps, didn’t exactly have a winning set of cards in his hand. First, he was a natural left wing on a club that employs Alex Ovechkin and Alexander Semin in that capacity (yes, we know…Semin plays a lot of right wing, too). For Fleischmann that meant playing on the other side or getting fewer minutes on the third or fourth line. Having had some experience as a center in his past, he was given an opportunity to take up the second line center role this season, and in fact auditioned for this role in the second half of last season. It was a position that he was either an ill fit for, or was one that would require quite a bit of time to develop a comfort zone in playing it. His faceoff efficiency and his defense weren’t of the sort that a team needs to compete against the Pittsburghs and Philadelphias of the world – teams that are very deep at the center position.

What Fleischmann did provide was secondary scoring, improving his goal scoring from four (in 29 games) in 2006-2007 to 10 to 19 to 23 last season. He did this despite battling illness in the middle of the 2008-2009 season and missing the first ten games of the 2009-2010 season with the after effects of a blood clot in his leg. He got off to a slow start this season (four goals in 23 games) and was seeing more time on the third and fourth lines. A scoring forward on a team with a lot of them, especially when he was not scoring, became less a luxury than a burden. There was also the fact that Fleischmann was being pressured from below by Marcus Johansson and Mathieu Perreault for a spot on one of the top three lines.

And it is in that respect that the move to Colorado might serve to jump start Fleischmann’s career. He will have competition for time on either of the top two lines, certainly, more when Mueller and Stewart return. But there would appear to be more openings for a player of Fleischmann’s profile with Colorado than there would be in Washington.

For Scott Hannan, it is a chance to fill a specific need on a club that has few of them, but critical ones. The Caps have two distinct weaknesses on this year’s roster – the lack of a second line center and the lack of depth on defense. Hannan addresses the latter in several ways:

-- He was leading the Avalanche in penalty killing ice time per game. His 3:21 in PK time per game exceeds that of all Capitals except for Jeff Schultz (3:40/game). He could provide some relief for the likes of Mike Green in this regard, who is skating 2:57 of his total 25:30 a game on the penalty kill, thus leaving Green a bit fresher.

-- Hannan was skating 18:37 a night for the Avalanche, 15:11 at even strength. It is his lowest average ice time since skating 19:02 a game for San Jose in 2000-2001. Even if Hannan is not a 20-minute a game defenseman a night (and chances are he will not be, given that he won’t see any power play time), he will be assuming the 15 minutes a night John Erskine was getting or the 12 that Tyler Sloan was getting, and perhaps providing a bit of relief for the big minute guys – Mike Green (reducing his PK time), John Carlson, and Jeff Schultz.

-- Adding Hannan allows the Caps to implement a more reasonable rotation of defensemen. We’ve made the point that the Caps, if history is a guide, are likely to dress ten different defensemen over the course of the year. The Caps now have a passable eight in Green, Schultz, Carlson, Karl Alzner, Tom Poti, Hannan, Erskine, and Sloan. It will allow Bruce Bourdreau more of a luxury in giving a top-six guy a breather in favor of Erskine (who has played quite well so far this season) or Sloan. It is the difference between using Erskine and Sloan in spot duty versus relying on them to assume significant minutes in roles that might be above their respective comfort levels.

-- Hannan provides experience. He has 775 games of regular season experience in the NHL. That is more than the combined games experience of Jeff Schultz, John Carlson, Karl Alzner, and Mike Green (732 games). Adding someone who has been through it, who knows how to play the game, who can supplement the experience of a Tom Poti (795 games of experience) should not be discounted.

-- Little things. Hannan might be 6’1”, 225, but he is not a big hitter (he has three more than Jeff Schultz, for example, and two fewer than Mike Green). But he does block shots (second on the Avalanche), a commodity that is more and more important with the quality of shooters in the NHL these days.

-- It might be a bit early to look at a statistic such as this, but in Hannan’s last 54 playoff games he is 1-9-10, plus-14. Not spectacular, but then again, spectacular for a stay-at-home defenseman usually means spectacularly bad things. We’ll take that sort of steady performance.

The Caps dealt from a position of strength (scoring forward) to fill a specific need. This is what good teams do as part of their personnel management strategy (and why drafting for need isn’t often a good idea – you wait too long to fill that need as the player develops) and, just as important, what teams that have drafted and developed well can afford to do. The proof will be in the playing, but at the moment this is a trade that looks quite good for both teams.

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Caps vs. Blues, December 1st

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

The Caps take to the road to open the month of December with a visit to St. Louis. There, they will find…..

“HALAK!...AH-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!”

Uh, yeah, that’s right. Jaroslav Halak will probably be starting for the Blues in goal, given that he has appeared in 18 of the 22 games the Blues have played thus far (and Ty Conklin played last night). But there is more to the Blues than…

“HALAK!...AH-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!”

Yes, they have quite a promising defensive corps playing behind…

“HALAK!...AH-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!”

I beg your pardon, but is all that “Halak-ing” really necessary? It’s not as if the Caps haven’t seen…

“HALAK!...AH-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!”

Now cut that out! St. Louis has won 12 games so far with more than just…

“HALAK!...AH-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!”

Alright, that cuts it. I’ve had about enough of this shouting “Halak” and the creepy laughter. Who in blazes are you, anyway?

Well, I guess “HALAK!” sounds more intimidating than “CAREY!” but still, there is more to the Blues than their new goaltender. Here are the overall numbers (before last night's games)...

Truth be told, there isn't much to the Blues' offensive statistics. Andy McDonald leads the Blues in scoring (8-9-17), but his point total would be good only for a tie for fourth on the Caps. Statistically, his career scoring line per 82 games (21-36-57) looks a lot like ex-Cap Brendan Morrison (18-36-54), the difference being that McDonald still seems to have gas in the tank at age 33. Last season McDonald finished 24-33-57 in 79 games. So far this season he has been something of a jack-of-all-trades, logging more than a minute a game on the penalty kill, almost four minutes on the power play, and 15 minutes a night to take up the remainder of his 20 minutes a night. He has been productive of late (6-6-12, plus-3) in his last ten games. What he does not have is much experience against the Caps. Since the lockout McDonald has faced the Caps only three times (1-2-3, plus-2).

While McDonald centers the top line, the second line features three players, all of whom have played in the pivot this season. Patrik Berglund is the nominal center of this group, and he goes into tonight’s action as the Blues’ second leading scorer, behind McDonald. Berglund had a fine rookie campaign two years ago (21-26-47 in 76 games) but suffered something of a sophomore slump last season (13-13-26 in 71 games. Through 22 games this season he is on a pace closer to that of his rookie year, having put up five goals and nine assists so far. But with T.J. Oshie on the shelf for perhaps the rest of the season with a broken ankle, more production out of Berglund is needed to take some of the pressure off the defense and…

HALAK!

Yeah, Halak. Flanking Berglund on Tuesday against the Blackhawks and perhaps Wednesday against the Caps are Vladimir Sobotka and David Backes. Sobotka is in his first season with the Blues after spending parts of three seasons in Boston. Offense is not, at least not yet, a featured part of his game (6-16-22 in 134 games with the Bruins). He has yet to record a point against the Caps (three games). On the other side, Backes is 3-10-13 through 22 games and has not registered a goal in his last seven contests. A second line of Backlund, Sobotka, and Backes with a line of 9-22-31 leaves much to be desired in terms of offensive production.

The defense is a mix of youth (Alex Pietrangelo, Erik Johnson, Nikita Nikitin) and veterans (Erik Brewer, Barret Jackman). Of the ten defensemen dressing for the Blues so far this season, only Brewer is older than 30, and he is only 31. It is not a group that will contribute much in the way of offense (only eight of the 54 goals scored by the Blues so far), but given the Blues’ defensive success so far (seventh in goals allowed per game, lowest shots allowed per game), it has been an effective group in its own end. Alex Pietrangelo leads the group in scoring (1-11-12) and is logging almost 21 minutes a night in his first full season as a 20-year old.

Which brings us to…

HALAK!

Yeah, Halak. Jaroslav Halak has been the anchor in net that the Blues hoped he would be when he was obtained from Montreal for Lars Eller and Ian Schultz last June…sorta. Tied for eighth in wins (10), ninth in goals against average, Halak has been effective, but as far as efficiency his .911 save percentage (tied for 14th in the league) might be more a product of the Blues’ ability to keep shots from getting to the net than Halak’s ability to stop them once they get there. The odd part about Halak’s performance so far is that in games in which he faced fewer than 25 shots he is 2-5-0. In games in which he faced at least 25 shots he is 8-1-2. Caps fans might not be surprised by that contrarian trend, remembering as they will that he stopped 131 of 134 shots (a .978 save percentage facing almost 45 shots a game) in winning the last three games of last spring’s playoff series with Montreal against the Caps.


The Peerless’ Players to Ponder

St. Louis: Brad Boyes

In the 2007-2008 season Boyes put up 43 goals, and it looked as if the then 25-year old had a bright future as a high-end goal scorer. Well, since then he has scored 33 and 14 the past two seasons, and he is on a pace for 19 this season. Not bad, perhaps, but well short of his promise. He did have a four game goal scoring streak from November 11-19, but followed that up with a four game streak without a goal that continues into Tuesday’s game against Chicago (note: he did have a goal last night). That 2007-2008 season was the last time he potted a goal against the Caps – two, in fact, in a 4-3 St. Louis win. In two games since, he is without a point.

Washington: Marcus Johansson

With Tomas Fleischmann relocating to Denver, Johansson might be relocating to the second line. He is on a mini-run (1-2-3, plus 3 in his last two games). This will be only his second game against a Western Conference team (he was scoreless against Nashville in the Caps’ 3-2 overtime win on October 16th), and he has yet to register a point in three games played on the road so far.

Keys:

1. Discipline. On November 19th the Blues converted two of seven power play opportunities against Ottawa. In five games since, St. Louis has only one power play goal in only 13 opportunities and no power play goals in the last four games. The Blues have only 11 goals in those five games overall, five of them coming last night. Stay out of the box, and the Blues might have trouble scoring otherwise.

2. Avoid the eight ball. In two of the last three road games the Caps allowed three goals in the first period. They were shutout in both of those games by 5-0 scores. In the one game they got out of the first period without a blemish, they won, 3-2.

3. Closing out. The Caps are 11-0-0 when leading after two periods. To keep that mark in this game they have to do a good job in closing St. Louis down in the third period. The Blues are tied for 20th in third period goals scored; the Caps are tied for the ninth fewest number of third period goals allowed.

In the end, the game might be as much mental as anything else. Jaroslav Halak is the latest “hot” goaltender to snuff out Capital playoff hopes, and there is the possibility that the memories linger. Getting off to a good start is always a good thing, but would be especially helpful tonight. None of the Caps have especially big career numbers against the Blues, but then again, there aren’t a lot of games played against the Blues to build that kind of resume. Mike Green does have two goals in three career games against the Blues but has only one goal in his past nine games (none in his last five). Maybe it’s his night.

Caps 3 – Blues 2

Brooks, Brodeur, and Bad Trade Ideas

We find ourselves agreeing more often than we used to with our favorite crazy columnist, Larry Brooks of the New York Post. We attribute this to either the advancing years or wood beetles boring into our cranial spaces. But Brooks wrote a column published on Sunday that really had us wondering how much he really pays attention to teams not in the greater New York metropolitan area.

The argument concerned the current plight of the New Jersey Devils and the possibility that in order to save their future they might have to trade much of their present, including perhaps Martin Brodeur. The context in which Brooks makes this argument is the experience of the Philadelphia Flyers in the 2006-2007 season. The Flyers of that season were skating their way to a 22-48-12 season, the 22 wins representing the third lowest total for a Flyers team in club history.

In an effort to minimize the damage, Flyer general manager Paul Holmgren traded a legendary, but aging star – Peter Forsberg – to Nashville for Scottie Upshall, Ryan Parent, and Nashville’s first and third round picks in the 2007 draft (that third was eventually traded to the Caps and became Phil Desimone).* Upshall later was traded to Phoenix with a 2011 second round draft pick for Daniel Carcillo. Parent was traded to Nashville for Dan Hamhuis and a conditional pick in the 2011 draft. Hamhuis, a pending free agent, did not come to terms with the Flyers and was traded to Pittsburgh for a third round choice in 2011.

The point Brooks is trying to make here is that the Flyers saw the problem looming in their future – a team that would struggle with aging players – and sought to mitigate that damage by moving an asset for youth (never mind that he got the particulars wrong).

The relevance to the Capitals comes later in the column…

“What [Devils’ GM Lou Lamoriello] has on his team are nine players with no-trade clauses who would have to be massaged in order to be moved -- impending free agents Jamie Langenbrunner and Jason Arnott are worthy -- and what he has is Martin Brodeur.

“Understand, the only way a Brodeur trade becomes a part of the conversation is if the all-time goaltender himself initiates the conversation with Lamoriello.

“If that were to happen, if Brodeur, 38 and on the penultimate season of his contract, were to tell Lamoriello that he'd be OK with a trade to a blue-chip contender in need of a blue-chip goaltender, oh, and let's just say he names Washington, then Lamoriello might well have his Forsberg and the Devils might well have John Carlson or Karl Alzner -- or Mike Green? -- plus a young forward along with a critically needed No. 1.”

Let us see if we have this right. The Devils, hypothetically, would move Martin Brodeur to Washington for one of John Carlson, Karl Alzner, or Mike Green; a young forward (Eric Fehr? Tomas Fleischmann? Marcus Johansson?); and a number one draft pick?

Are you kidding me? Let’s say, for the sake of argument that this deal looks like Brodeur for Alzner, Johansson, and a number one pick. This year, Brodeur’s cap hit ($5,200,000; annualized) is twice that of the combination of Alzner and Johansson ($2,575,000, including bonuses; annualized). Even with the season almost one third completed, the difference in cap hit (assuming the deal was to be made soon) would be between $1.5 and $2.0 million. And, the Caps give up a top-four defenseman from a roster already thin in NHL-capable defensemen and a center who could very well be a reliable third-line center (if not a second) by the spring in an organization that doesn’t have a lot of center options (well, good ones) after Nicklas Backstrom on the top line. Further, assuming the marginal cap hit that Brodeur brings would constrain the Caps’ ability to fill defenseman and/or center needs in the spring via trade.

Then there is next season. The full brunt of the last year of Brodeur’s contract would hit the Caps’ books, and this would be coming in the midst of other important salary decisions – Alexander Semin, Mike Knuble, Tomas Fleischmann, and Brooks Laich (among others) would be unrestricted free agents; Semyon Varlamov would be a restricted free agent.

Which brings up the matter of a decision point – one of Neuvirth or Varlamov would almost have to be moved. And the Caps had better pick correctly, since Brodeur would not be with the team after the 2011-2012 season. The Caps could find themselves depleting much of their future for the sake of a goaltender who has had iffy playoff performances over the past four seasons (failing to get out of the first round in the last three) and who had a sub-par start to this season before sustaining an injury.  You could argue that moving Varlamov or Neuvirth could bring back that center or defenseman the Caps need, but will that player fit under the salary cap?

It is in this respect that we just do not suspect Brooks has been paying attention, at least to how the Caps have been doing business since the great selloff. The club has taken great pains and has exhibited great patience in assembling a roster by building from within. The club has not been entirely averse to signing free agents (Mike Knuble, Tom Poti) or making trades (Jason Chimera). But the important pieces are home grown, including the three goalies who have dressed for the Caps this year, none of them older than 22.

For the Caps to mortgage a significant chunk of their future for an aging star – even a hall of famer in waiting – would not be consistent with their behavior the past five years. To do it for an aging star giving indications of being in decline would border on insanity. This is the sort of trade the folks at Puck Daddy might highlight. Oh wait… they did. Well, sorta.


* Brooks actually gets the deal here incorrect, at least in the particulars. He stated that “[Forsberg’s] trade to Nashville that ultimately brought back Scottie Upshall, Kimmo Timonen and Scott Hartnell represented the underpinning of the immediate 2007-08 revival.” In fact, Forsberg was traded to Nashville in February 2007; Hartnell and Timonen were obtained in June for a first round draft pick in 2007 (Jonathon Blum), which previously belonged to Nashville, obtained in a separate deal. OK, it was the Forsberg deal, so we guess the two are related.

That Was The Week That Was: November 21-27, By the Tens

The last full week of November is in the books, and here is how it went …

Record for the week: 2-1-0

After riding over some bumpy road early this week that started late in the previous week, the Caps found their stride again to close the week. The 5-0 shutout loss to the New Jersey Devils on Monday was the Caps’ second 5-0 whitewashing in three games, and it had the potential to become a worse situation when after the game, during the press conference outside the Caps locker room, Alex Ovechkin, Alexander Semin, and the Devils’ Ilya Kovalchuk were close enough to coach Bruce Boudreau to raise his hackles a bit when one of the players could be heard laughing. While this stuff probably goes on in 30 of 30 rinks in the NHL, having it happen within the range of open microphones had the makings of an embarrassing situation for the Caps. What it did, though, was signal the low point of the season, from which the Caps rose to beat Carolina in Raleigh (3-2), then swatted away the upstart Tampa Bay Lightning back in D.C. (6-0).

Offense: 3.00/game

If the average was somewhat low for the Caps, one had to like the progression – none, three, and six goals in the three games. This week it was the second period in which the Caps dominated. Yes, they were outscored 2-0 in the second period in the 5-0 loss to New Jersey, but they outscored Carolina, 1-0, and Tampa Bay by a 4-0 margin in the other two middle frames in the week. It was a bit of an odd week in that the Caps managed no goals on 30 shots against the Devils and only two goals on 38 shots against Carolina, but they torched Tampa Bay for half a dozen on only 29 shots in the third game of the week. Alex Ovechkin was the top point-getter of the week with five points, all of them coming on helpers. Alexander Semin led the Caps in goals, getting all three in his third hat trick of the season, this one in a 6-0 win over Tampa Bay. A couple of firsts this week – Brian Fahey registered his first NHL point with an assist in the Tampa win, and Marcus Johansson recorded his first multi-point game with a pair of assists in the Tampa win.


Defense: 2.33/game

Again, it’s the progression – five, two, and no goals allowed. You get the sense, though, that they can be better. Allowing five goals to one of the least productive offenses in the league (and none of those goals coming off the stick of Ilya Kovalchuk) has to be disappointing. But to the Caps’ credit they clamped down hard on the Hurricanes and Lightning to close the week. They allowed only 45 shots combined in the last two games of the week, the second lowest two-game total of shots allowed so far this season.

Goaltending: 2.34/.903

The big story this week was the return of Semyon Varlamov to the nets. And a fine return he had, not that he had an especially high volume of shots to face. In the two games he played last week he faced a total of 49 shots, stopping 47 of them (.959). Although it has been interrupted by a lengthy (34-day) stretch on the shelf due to injury, his start is looking better than last year’s. In his first four appearances this season he is 2-1-0, 1.88, .928, with one shutout. In his first four appearances last season he was 3-0-0, 3.01, .895. What should not be lost in this week was a gutty performance by Braden Holtby to open the week. Not that he was good, he wasn’t. But he gritted it out, taking a shellacking for the team (five goals allowed on 23 shots faced) with Michal Neuvirth injured and Varlamov on the bench, but almost unavailable for play given that he was coming back from an injury and had just played two games in the previous two nights in Hershey.

Power Play: 3-11 (27.3 percent)

One more time… the progression. No power play goals in the game last Monday against the Devils, one against Carolina, and two against Tampa Bay. Alexander Semin had two as part of his hat trick against Tampa Bay, but it was just as nice to see Brooks Laich get one against Carolina, breaking a seven game streak without an extra man goal. Hopefully it will spring him loose in that regard. The marker against the Hurricanes was Laich’s third power play goal of the year. He had 12 such goals last season. Overall the Caps recorded three power play goals on 22 shot attempts covering 11 power plays. The 11 power plays in three games is getting a little closer to the average number of opportunities per game the Caps had last season (3.82), but 3.67 for the week still leaves the Caps short of maximizing their potential, given the efficiency the power play unit continues to demonstrate.


Penalty Killing: 10-12 (83.3 percent)

A solid week from the Caps on the PK. They allowed a goal on the first power play they faced, the first goal in a 5-0 loss to New Jersey. After that they skated off 10 of 11. The success was earned, in part, by denying opportunities to opponents. In 12 power plays faced the Caps allowed only 12 shots on goal. The Caps also had five shorthanded shots on goal, all coming in the last two games of the week. The ability to make teams defend when on their own power play goes a long way to making for a successful penalty killing unit.


Paying the Price: 77 hits/40 blocked shots

What might have seemed like a light week in blocked shots might be a product of scoring peculiarities in New Jersey, where the Caps were credited with only three blocks (the Devils were credited with only six). But in each of the three games the Caps finished with more hits than their opponent and were credited with more blocked shots than their opponent in each of the last two games of the week. If you accept the notion that any scoring bias (e.g., toward underreporting hits or blocked shots) is evenly applied to the teams in a game, then the Caps being on the long end of hits and blocked shots more often during the week can be recorded as a good week.


Faceoffs: 93-172 (54.1 percent)

The Caps did even or better in all three games for the week. It allowed them to climb to 11th in the league in faceoffs and within another good week of jumping up several more places. It was a case of taking advantage of weak teams in the last two games of the week, Tampa Bay ranking in the lower half of the league standings and Carolina being the worst in the league on draws by a fairly wide margin (barely 40 percent as a team). It was nice having Boyd Gordon back to take draws, too. He was 20-for-29 for the week.

Turnovers: Plus-3

It was a lot better week in protecting the puck than the previous week’s minus-14. The Caps were even or better in each of the games. Noteworthy was the reduction in “unforced” turnovers – giveaways. The Caps had only 19 giveaways in three games last week, compared with 41 the week before in four games.

Impressions:

Two wins in a week might not seem like much, but if the Caps average that over the remainder of the season they will add 38 wins to the total of 16 with which they finished the week, tying last season’s franchise record-setting 54 wins. Laughter-gate seems to be shrinking in the rear-view mirror with the two wins to close the week.

Getting points from 11 players is approaching the sort of balance you would like to see over a stretch of games, and this past week’s scoring lines are impressive in that none of the nine goals were recorded by Alex Ovechkin, and three defensemen had goals, none of them named “Mike Green.” Green, in fact, did not record a point this past week. What it suggests is that even with the Caps scoring six on Tampa Bay, it is a team that has not yet really put it all together for a stretch of games. And for a team that is in the midst of a 9-2-2 month at the end of this past week, not to mention leading the league in standings points, the league should be on guard that the day is coming when the Caps do start putting it all together. For the teams having to face that Caps team, it will not be pleasant.

A TWO-point night -- Game 25: Caps 3 - Hurricanes 2 (OT/SO)

For the Carolina Hurricanes tonight goaltender Cam Ward was their best player. It was not enough, though, as the Washington Capitals shook off a tying goal with 2.2 seconds left in regulation to beat the Hurricanes, 3-2, in a Gimmick-decided result.

It did not look as if the Caps would have to worry late, jumping out to a 2-0 lead in the first period and outshooting Carolina 17-7 in the first 20 minutes. Marcus Johnasson started and ended the play that resulted in the first goal, beginning the sequence by sending the puck deep and around the boards from just inside the Carolina blue line. Eric Fehr then took advantage of Joni Pitkanen’s inability to control the puck cleanly coming around to the right wing corner. Fehr picked Pitkanen’s pocket and slipped the puck out to Johansson, who had moved to goalie Cam Ward’s left. Johansson turned and pulled the puck across the crease, just outside Ward’s reach to poke it away, then tucked it under Ward’s right pad to open the scoring.

Alexander Semin staked the Caps to a two-goal lead late in the first period when he converted a ice feed from Alex Ovechkin, who worked his way down the left side on defenseman Tim Gleason. Ovechkin had options as he was moving in on Gleason – shoot through the legs, turn and cut to the center, go wide around him. But what Ovechkin did was something he might not have attempted, let alone converted before this season. He feinted as if cutting to the middle, then cut wide, reaching around Gleason to snap the puck across to Semin coming down the right side. The pass caught Semin right in stride, and all that was left to do was to flick the puck high over the sliding goaltender and into the back of the net.

Carolina evened the game with goals early in the second – a doorstep goal from Erik Cole 50 seconds into the period – and late in the third period. The late goal came on a goal-mouth scramble in the last eight seconds of regulation. It started in the most improbable way. Eric Staal and David Steckel skated in to take a faceoff in the Caps’ defensive zone with eight seconds left. Staal came into the game with one of the worst faceoff winning percentages in the league (42.8 percent ), Steckel with one of the best (64.3 percent). And in this game Steckel had already won eight of ten, while Staal won only 10 of 23. But no one wins them all, and Steckel lost this one cleanly to Staal. That started a flurry that ended in front of the Caps’ net and Staal flipping a loose puck in the paint over goalie Semyon Varlamov to tie the game with 2.2 seconds left.

Overtime passed without a goal, but not without its dicey moment. Varlamov kept the Hurricanes from enabling the Caps to get to the skills competition with a chance to get the second standings point they could not secure in the hockey phase of the contest. After Jeff Skinner failed on his attempt to start off the proceedings, Alex Ovechkin converted the first chance for the Caps by going wide, circling in, patiently waiting for Cam Ward to commit, then and lifting the puck over Ward’s left pad. The Caps would not score again, but at the other end Semyon Varlamov didn’t allow the Hurricanes even a crack in the door of opportunity. He stymied Jussi Jokinen and Tuomo Ruutu to seal the win, the Caps’ third in a row after their three game losing streak.

Other Stuff…

-- At the 25-game mark the Caps are two points ahead of last year’s franchise record-setting points pace (36 points to 34) and three wins ahead of its record-setting wins mark from a year ago (17 to 14). Of course, last year featured a 14-game winning streak, but even in the absence of that in this season the Caps are on a pace to finish 56-20-6, a 118-point pace.

-- Late in the game, Darren Pang tweeted…

OK, fair enough. Staal won the faceoff late and scored the game tying goal. Meanwhile, Alex Ovechkin gave up a shooting opportunity for a better chance on the stick of Alexander Semin in the first period and buried the game-winning goal in the skills competition. If you are not aware, the assist was Ovechkin’s 22nd of the season, putting him atop the list of wingers in the assist column. And to reduce more finely by position, he has a whopping lead (22-16) in assists over his closest competitor at left wing.

-- The Caps have scored 84 goals in 25 games. The 3.36 goals/game is down from last year’s full-year mark of 3.82. However, it is almost exactly the number of goals they scored through the first 25 games last season (85).

-- Eric Staal might not be the best faceoff guy in the league, and he did have a losing record in this game (12-for-25), but Tuomo Ruutu… oh-for-10? Small wonder he is 88th of 90 skaters on the faceoff leader tables. In fact, Carolina has three of the worst seven players among faceoff leaders – Staal (84th of 90), Ruutu (88th), and Brandon Sutter (89th).

-- Tom Poti would have had a really nice game…except for those last eight seconds. Jeff Schultz was able to get inside position and tie up Jussi Jokinen in the pile-up in the final seconds, but Poti could not tie up Staal’s stick, despite having inside position on him on the play. The play started with Poti on the goal line to receive the draw from Steckel, were he to win it (pictures captured from highlights on nhl.com)…

When Steckel did not, Poti tried to cut Staal off from getting position driving to the net, which he appeared to do…

…but he could not tie up Staal’s stick, and Staal’s reach allowed him to flip a backhand past Varlamov to tie the game…

-- Ovechkin had 12 shot attempts for the game, seven of them on goal with none of them finding the back of the net. But there didn’t look to be an easy save in the bunch for Ward.

-- Not often you see the losing goaltender get the game’s first star, but it was deserved. A lesser goaltending performance – against Ovechkin alone – and this game would have been over at the first intermission. If it was against a different opponent, we would say that Cam Ward deserved a better fate.

-- We are starting to get the feeling that there is no “number one” defensive pairing. The top two pairs of defensemen – Mike Green and Jeff Schultz, and John Carlson and Karl Alzner – had almost identical ice times, ranging from 23:08 (Alzner) to 25:09 (Carlson). Part of that was Mike Green going off after blocking a shot, but the rookies (we still think of Alzner as a rookie) are taking their place in the rotation of responsible minutes and doing good things with those minutes. Carlson had four hits, four shots, and three blocked shots; Alzner had four blocked shots and a takeaway.

-- Tomas Fleischmann had two shots on goal in the first minute of play… one over the last 64 minutes. He did, however, win nine of 13 draws. But it is worth noting that he started the game getting more than five minutes of ice time in the first period, almost four in the second, and just over three in the third (also a 40 second shift in overtime).

-- The Caps have a very efficient power play, but the continuing problem with it is not having the opportunity to unleash it often enough. Tonight they had one – one! – power play. They should have had one in overtime when Erik Cole upended Alex Ovechkin, but...

-- As it was, the Caps managed twice as many shots on goal on their lone power play (four) than Carolina had on the three power plays they had (two). In fact, the Caps had as many shorthanded shots on goal (two) as the Hurricanes had on their own power plays.

-- It is also worth noting that Semyon Varlamov has faced only 77 shots in the three games since his return (25.7/game). That he has a save percentage of .948 in those three games suggests that for the moment he has moved ahead of Michal Neuvirth in the goaltending order. But with 57 games to go, this is likely to be a back-and-forth thing, hopefully of the sort that finds one or the other turning in fine performances when called upon.

-- The Caps blocked 25 Carolina shots tonight. Jeff Schultz had almost a third of them (seven).

In the end, it was another one-goal win (eight, tops in the league), another extra time win (six, most in the league). Precisely the testing ground this club might need to prepare for closer-to-the-vest games that they will see in the playoffs. What is more, these one-goal games are not fire wagon games with lots of goals. Of the 11 one-goal decisions the Caps have had (8-1-2), they allowed only as many as four goals in regulation twice. They allowed two or fewer in regulation in eight games.

You could look at the 42 goals allowed in 14 games this month and conclude that the Caps haven’t done a very good job on defense. But remember, too, that 14 goals were allowed in a three-game stretch. Otherwise the Caps have allowed 28 goals in 11 games, a respectable 2.55 per game. That three game stretch has to be looked at as an anomaly. In their last 18 games the Caps have allowed more than three goals five times, three of them coming in that three-game stretch. There isn’t likely to be a Jennings Trophy at the end of this for the Caps’ goaltenders having allowed the fewest goals in the league, but it is a defense that is improved over last season.

Now the Caps go on the road, first to a place where few teams (well, two) have visited and won this season – St. Louis – then to a city where the Caps have had difficulty winning (13-22-8 overall, 2-7-1 in their last ten visits). It will be quite a test for a club looking to hold off the Philadelphia Flyers and the charging Pittsburgh Penguins for the top spot in the East. But they got off to a good start with a good getaway game tonight for their league-leading 17th win.