Hello All,
The Washington Capitals continue to be one of the most surprising stories of the season. Today I am going to touch on my thoughts from the game against the Jets on Friday as well as the stats. In addition, we will look at the week ahead and what could be in store for the Caps
Here are the stats from the Friday night game against the Jets:
Shots on Goal: WSH – 39 WPG – 42
Shots on Goal (5v5): WSH – 31 WPG- 33
Corsi For %: WSH – 45.8%% WPG – 54.3%
Corsi For % (5v5): WSH – 47.22% WPG – 52.78%
Power Play: WSH – 0/2 WPG – 1/3
Hits: WSH – 29 WPG – 20
Blocks: WSH – 16 WPG -26
Scoring Chances For: WSH – 34 WPG - 48
Scoring Chances For (5v5): WSH – 32 WPG - 37
High Danger Chances For: WSH – 14 WPG – 19
High Danger Chances For: (5v5): WSH – 13 WPG – 14
My Takeaways:
The Capitals were slightly outplayed by Winnipeg. The Caps did let a 2-goal lead slip away but held on and pulled away at the end with 2 empty net goals while holding a 3-2 lead. Contrary to what the statistics say, this was a pretty strong effort by the short-handed Capitals. The list of players missing from the lineup was…extensive. The 1st Star of the game was appropriately awarded to Vitek Vanecek. It is nice to see him play such a solid game. The Capitals goaltending situation is certainly one to keep an eye on. We have seen a lot of Samsonov lately, but I expect Vanecek to get more starts in the near future. Laviolette tends to lean slightly towards the hot hand.
Honorable Mention: As if we do not hear about it enough, but Alex Ovechkin is on fire. He picked up an EN goal and now has 22 goals on the season. Draisaitl leads the league with 23 goals, Auston Matthews is third in the league with 20. Ovechkin is on a quest for many things, one of which is that he is looking to win the Rocket Richard trophy for a league leading 10th time. Pretty cool to see if he can pull it off. I will write more than a couple pieces on Ovechkin coming up here shortly. He is off to one of the best starts to a season in his entire career. People keep thinking he will slow down but he just keeps going.
The Week Ahead: Sunday 12/19 vs LAK @ 7pm ET Tuesday 12/21 @PHI @ 7pm ET Thursday 12/23 @ NYI @ 7pm ET
*Two division road games this week will be a good test for the Capitals. These are two teams the Caps should beat on paper but you both PHI and NYI have traditionally matched up well against the Caps the past few years. Between injuries and COVID protocols…its anyone guess how this week will go. TJ Oshie was the most recent Capitals player placed in protocol. Ugh.
Thanks for reading, GO CAPS