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Penguins gameday? What a foreign concept. The Penguins have not played since their 2-1 victory over the Calgary Flames on Saturday night. Their opponent, the Washington Capitals, played last night and lost in a shootout to the San Jose Sharks.
The lone goal scorer for the Sharks was a familiar face, Tyleeeeeer Kennedy, Kennedy.
The Penguins have literally no excuse to not come out tonight and skate hard. Sometimes you run into bad puck luck or a bad night from a goaltender but what can be controlled is effort level. Considering the Penguins extremely light game schedule it would be a crime if they came out tonight and did not put forth an incredibly solid effort level.
Penguins fans better savor the flavor because the Penguins don’t have another game until next Monday! That’s crazy.
The injury bug has hit the Penguins once again and it is now to the point where I can’t even give proper analysis of the call-ups. This is the only thing that comes to mind for me:
The Penguins have called up another two forwards from WB/S. The first call-up is Nick Drazenovic who has 20 points in 26 games with the Baby Pens. Interesting note, Drazenovic received notice of his call-up on his 27th birthday, not a bad gift.
The other call-up was Pierre-Luc Letourneau-Leblond. To be blunt this player has more syllables (8) in his name than he has points this year (2). He does have 137 PIM, which basically means he is in the mold of a Steve MacIntyre, judging solely by statistics.
Line Combos
Kunitz-Crosby-Sutter Jokinen-Malkin-Neal Glass-Drazenovic-Adams Leblond/Pyatt-Sill-Engelland
Good grief, how low can the bottom 6 go? At least they have thrown Brandon Sutter a life raft.
Orpik-Bortuzzo Scuderi-Letang Maatta-Niskanen-Despres
Despres will probably be the odd man out.
Power Play 1
Neal-Crosby-Kunitz Letang-Malkin
Projected lineup for the Capitals
Fehr-Grabovski-Ovechkin Laich-Backstrom-Brouwer Chimera-Johansson-Ward Volpatti-Beagle-Wilson
Alzner-Carlson Orlov-Green Erskine-Carrick
Injuries
Paul Martin, Beau Bennett, Jayson Megna, Andrew Ebbett, and Chuck Kobasew skated before practice but did not take part in the game skate.
Fenclose %
Penguins continue their free fall from the top 5 and are now ranked 10th at 52.1% Travis Yost has a great breakdown of the teams that have improved the most or slid the most from quarter 1 to quarter 2 of the season. The Penguins are the team that has slid the most in the Eastern Conference. Obviously this highly correlates with the incredible amount of injuries the forward ranks have suffered.
The Capitals are 22nd overall with 48.1%
Power Play
This game has the top 2 power plays in the league. The Penguins are #1 overall with 25.2%. Barely behind them are the Capitals at 25.0%. There is a good chance that the Capitals could leave this game with the #1 overall power play in the NHL
The Penguin are 18th with 155 power play opportunities
The Capitals are tied for 11th with 160
Penalty Kill
The two teams may be close in power play rankings but this is not the case with the penalty kill. The Penguins are the 2nd ranked PK in the league with 87.5% The Capitals are tied for 17th with 80.5%.
The Penguins rank tied for 5th in the amount of times they have been shorthanded with 144.
The Capitals rank 22nd with 164 times shorthanded.
Even Strength Save Percentage
The Penguins rank 23rd overall with .914%
The Capitals are tied for 10th overall with .926%
The Capitals have been getting solid play from newcomer Philipp Grubauer who has an EVSV% of .934% however they will be turning to Michael Neuvirth tonight who sits at .918%.
Marc Andre Fleury is also at .918% at even strength.
Trends
Capitals are 2-5 in their last 7 road games
Capitals are 2-6 in their last 8 overall.
Capitals are 1-5 in their last 6 games following OT on the previous day
Capitals are 0-5 in their last 5 Wednesday games
Penguins are 9-1 in their last 10 vs. Metropolitan
Capitals are 0-5 in the last 5 meetings Stats courtesy of Covers.com
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