Orlov and Tarasenko: BFFs.

The St. Louis Blues are really good. I don’t know if the Capitals are having a bad weekend, or if it’s that their opponents have just been really good. I’m not sure how much it matters: another loss. Zero points on the weekend. Major bummer.

Jori Lehtera scored first, exploiting some distracted defense. Joel Ward tied it up with a lucky long bomb that trickled past Brian Elliott. Before the second period was up, Jaden Schwartz outlasted Karl Alzner in the paint to restore the Blues’ lead. Justin Peters misplayed a puck behind his net (sound familiar?) to give David Backes a lay-up just twelve seconds in the third period. Patrik Berglund made it 4-1 with a lovely, unchallenged passing play late in the game.

Blues beat Caps 4-1.

• Not the best weekend for Caps hockey.
• Justin Peters did not have a strong outing, and his goof at the beginning of the third period was just about as bad as Holtby’s one night prior. Then again, no matter how good or bad the Caps goalie was, the offense needs to score more in order to win.

Mitch Korn is all about the props when working with his goalies. I have an idea for a new one. pic.twitter.com/p3cnvOOSuB

— Becca (@BeccaH_JR) November 16, 2014

• I’ll have more on this in the snapshot, but Brooks Orpik and John Carlson are doing poorly in their current role. They hardly saw the offensive zone on Saturday night– sporting a minus-15 shot-attempt differential midway through the third period. It’s not fun to watch Carlson loses battles and Orpik blow passes, but those events seem to be the hallmark of Caps defense. They seemed incapable of clearing the zone cleanly and on the first try. Yuck.
• Tom Wilson fought Ryan Reaves at the tail end of the second period. “This is why Wilson is on the top line,” Craig Laughlin said after the bout. Wait, I’m confused. Is he really on the Capitals’ premiere scoring line to punch and get punched? Is Alex Ovechkin, the league’s only true power forward, really not capable of taking care of himself? What kind of player does the team want Tom Wilson to become? I loved his physical play in the third period, particularly in the offensive zone, but when the gloves hit the ice, I dunno.
• The Washington Wizards are off to a hot start, so here’s my revised and slightly crowdsourced Wizards power ranking.
  1. Gandalf the Gray
  2. Joel Ward
  3. Doctor Strange
  4. “Californiaaaaaaaa”
  5. Gandalf the White
  6. Merlin
  7. Dumbledore
• Thank you, Joel Ward, for scoring the only Capitals goal in 120 minutes of hockey this weekend. I had to miss my buddy’s birthday party to cover this game, and Wardo’s trickler was the only part of it I enjoyed.
• It’s probably best if you don’t look at the faceoff stats.
• If you look closely, there were actually a few bright spots in this game. The Capitals’ top six weren’t really outplayed except for those first couple shifts. The trouble was with the depth– Fehr and Kuznetsov’s lines– and with the Caps’ ill-advised shutdown pairing. Plus Tom Wilson almost killed a guy, and that’s always fun.
• Nope. No need for a power play. Thanks for offering though.

Joe B suit of the night. Not my favorite.

So ends a crummy weekend of crummy hockey.

The goalies are an easy target, and both of them made goofs, but it’s lazy and objectively incorrect to pin these losses on them alone. You cannot win a hockey game with zero goals scored (I checked) and it’s awful hard to win when you beat the other guy just once (thanks, wizard wardo). Even if Peters didn’t giftwrap that one for Backes, this game was a loser because the Caps couldn’t score but once.

Feel free to do some reflexive adjudication on which goals were “soft” and which “he should of had” and which “he’s gonna want back,” but please do not confuse that judgement for anything substantial or constructive or worth the time to read or hear.

The goalie was below average tonight. The skaters were wayyyy below average. That’s the big problem.

Someone on Twitter asked me if it’s time to start panicking.

NOT YET.

Full RMNB Coverage of Caps at Blues