The Capitals went 19 days and 9 games without losing until the Carolina Hurricanes cracked the code on New Years Eve. On the back half of back-to-back games, with mounting injuries, blah play during 5v5, and a terrible performance by the second line, the Caps were bound to lose that game from the first puck drop.
Now, in a brand new year and with a bit of rest, the Caps are poised to start a new streak, starting with Lumbus, who are tortilly turrible.
Puck drops at 7 PM.
| Team | Record | Possession | PDO | Power Play | Penalty Kill |
| Washington Capitals | 28-7-2 | 51.4% | 102.0 | 25.2% | 86.1% |
| Columbus Blue Jackets | 14-22-0 | 47.2% | 99.0 | 17.4% | 81.2% |
Projected Lineup
I remember Pat decrying the Caps’ defensive depth at the beginning of the season, but wow. From Mike Vogel:
Ovechkin – Backstrom – Oshie
Burakovsky – Kuznetsov – Williams
Chimera – Johansson – Wilson
Laich – Sill – Latta
Alzner – Niskanen
Orlov – Schmidt
Ness – Chorney
Holtby
CORRECTION: I had Conner at 4C instead of Sill. My bust.
Torts on Ovi
#CBJ coach John Tortorella on Alex Ovechkin (1/2): "I’ve always respected him because he’ll take a hit and he’ll give a hit….
— Shawn Mitchell (@smitchcd) January 2, 2016
More #CBJ Tortorella on Ovechkin: "He’s not one of those guys who is a superstar in this league and thinks he deserves special treatment."
— Shawn Mitchell (@smitchcd) January 2, 2016
That’s nice, but Columbus still needs to fire John Tortorella and Jarmo Kekalainen like right now. Like yesterday.
Storylines
- Alex Ovechkin is an all-star. So is John Scott. My hot take: that wasn’t the worst pick of the four.
- Jay Beagle got wrist surgery and will be out until around Valentine’s Day.
- Sergei Bobrovsky‘s off the force. On IR with an injured groin.
- Roster moves: Connor Carrick down, Ryan Stanton up. I think Cricket did pretty well this time around.
- Jack Hillen retired.
- Rachel met Locker today. Check out the Lumbus fan in the background too.
Good omen to start the day: running into @Laughlin18 @ Tim Hortons! Thanks for taking the time to talk to my family! pic.twitter.com/X6sru15qON
— Rachel L. Cohen @ sporps hell (@kat326) January 2, 2016
- Let’s use tonight to contemplate Torts being the US’s head coach for the world cup of hockey. MFW:
This is Awesome
the winter classic pic.twitter.com/r1Pu7ApMSc
— Kevin Kan (@datarink) January 1, 2016
It just needs pew pew sound effects.
There are so many cool people doing neat data visualizations this season. Datarink, Classlicity, Ineffective Math, and ya boy Muneeb are just a few.
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