Follow @james_tanner123 The Capitals entered their bye-week with a sizable lead in the Metropolitan Division.
It doesn't matter that they're riding a shooting-percentage and goaltending bonanza, the people are getting wins and if the coach thinks Devonte Pelly-Smith is a guy who should play with Ovechkin and Backstrom, who am I to tell him differently?
Last night perfectly summed up the Capitals season: they were awful, and yet, they got a point.
First Period: 34% of the shot-attempts Second Period: 30% of the shot-attempts Third Period: 47% of the shot-attempts
Overall: 37% a number so low it can be categorized as sub-enforcer.
The Devils outshot the Capitals 27-13 at 5v5 - it was a beatdown.
Of course, the Capitals somehow managed to get this bad-boy to overtime where they picked up one of the least deserving points any NHL team has garnered this season.
Look, I'd like to tell you that the Capitals are an awesome team headed for great things, but I'd rather be a realist than a cheerleader.
People ask me all the time, when I point out how a team is being propped up by a goalie, 'isn't a goalie a part of the team?'
Of course he is. The thing is, we have a long history of NHL teams where goalies hid flaws from teams that were exposed once the goalie came back down to earth. The thing about playing so well that you hide your teams flaws is that it's not sustainable.
Even the best goalie of all-time couldn't hide the flaws of a bad team forever. Eventually regression to the norm will take place - Holtby be will slightly less excellent, and Ovechkin won't score on such a high percentage of his shots - when that happens (as is inevitable) the Capitals will collapse.
Now, as luck would have it, the Capitals have all but locked up a Playoff spot already. This means that perhaps they will go through a spell where they lose and be forced to make some decisions that winning can prevent you from having to make.
So it happens. It just isn't the ideal way to win. Of course the Capitals, who've been the best team in hockey several times and won nothing, can be forgiven if they don't buy into what I'm saying.
I mean, if being the best doesn't work, why bother, right? Haha
What is frustrating for me when I watch this team is that the coach seems so clueless. Ovechkin is a 48% player this year when on the ice with Pelly-Smith, the most common winger for OV and Backstrom. Without Pelly-Smith, Ovechkin jumps by a massive 2.5 percentage points to a far better 50.5%.
This might seem small, but the range of Corsi is so small that any upgrade is relatively huge. Without Ovechkin, Pelly-Smith falls to a 42% player.
I'm sorry for being so negative, but when you watch a team healthy-scratch the always effective Burakovsky while continuing to play Pelly-Smith on the first line, it's frustrating as hell. The worst thing for the Caps was getting a point out of last night's game, because it just gives positive re-enforcement to a bad game, and bad coaching.
To top it off, Marcus Johansson was a beast last night, making the Capitals look ridiculous for giving such a good player away. It is still mind-blowing what they got for him.
stats from naturalstattrick.com