Caps at Hawks Pregame: Crash the Net, Must the Win

November 7, 2014 4:00 pm

Elite defenseman. Elite toque. (Photo: Caps Instagram)

October 25th. I remember it well. It was a simpler time, back when the Caps still won hockey games, children spoke only when spoken to, and women knew their place.

Since then everything has gone wrong. Personally, I blame Congress.

(And volatile shooting percentages endemic to small sample sizes, particularly for a team that is not sufficiently aggressive during 5v5 when leading.)

Alright. Road game against the Chicago Blackhawks, who might be the best team in the league (Neil has them fourth in his power rankings). After losing to the Coyotes and the Flames, it would only make sense for the Caps to beat these guys. right?

Late game. 8:30 PM on CSN Plus. Grab a beer and watch with me. From your couch. Alone. Forever alone.

Team	Record	Possession	PDO	Power Play	Penalty Kill
Washington Capitals	4-5-3	54.4%	97.8	29.3%	79.1%
Chicago Blackhawks	7-5-1	56.1%	99.5	18.9%	92.7%

Projected Lineup

Straight from the horse’s mouth:

Ovechkin – Backstrom – Wilson
Johansson – Burakovsky – Brouwer
Chimera – Laich – Ward
O’Brien – Latta – Beagle

Orpik – Carlson
Alzner – Niskanen
Schmidt – Green

Holtby

Keith Olbermann Shreds the “Original Six”

Storylines

Brooks Laich is back! He missed 7 games to a shoulder injury.
Eric Fehr and Evgeny Kuznetsovs are healthy scratches.
The D pairings have been restored to their previous, not insane state.
Andre Burakovsky is struggling lately.
Also struggling: Braden Holtby. Adam Stringham wrote a good piece for the Rink about it, though I have some misgivings about attributing/personalizing bad goalie play over 200 shots and change.
Also also struggling: the Caps in general. Yay fun bullets today.
Check out the PuckBuddys pregamer, with some stirring insight from Second City Hockey.
Ads on jerseys on coming. Prepare yourself. Chipotle: raid the coffers.
You can call it “net presence” or “interior play.” We call it CRASH THE NET.