Capitals best Bruins in Beantown: numbers for the morning after

November 5, 2017 9:05 am

After a quick return to DC to play the Islanders, the Capitals returned to the road to play the Boston Bruins at TD Garden. The good guys came out victorious with a 3-2 win, giving them their first winning streak since the first three games of the season.

The Capitals were out-attempted 45 to 31 five-on-five and out shot 33 to 27. It’s like groundhog day.

Braden Holtby is again showing why he won that Vezina Trophy two seasons ago. The shot quality the Caps opposition have been getting this season would be giving 95 percent of other goaltenders in the NHL fits and probable heartburn. Holtby saved another 31 shots in this one and continued his career dominance of the Boston Bruins. In 14 games against the Bruins he is 12-2 with a .944 save percentage and a 1.81 goals against average. Those numbers do not include his stingy performance against Boston in the 2012 playoffs.

Scariest Halloween costume would have been a plain t-shirt with the 2017-18 Capitals roster taped to it, but with Braden Holtby not on it

— Chris Cerullo (@CJC_95) November 5, 2017

Brooks Orpik had another eventful night possession wise. That would be nice if those events were happening in the offensive zone. Orpik finished with a minus-10 shot attempt differential, “bested” only by his partner for the majority of the night, John Carlson with a minus-13. He also took a very easily preventable, four-minute high-sticking penalty that could have changed the end of this game if not for some good penalty killing. Cool shot block on Zdeno Chara at the end though, I guess.
The usage level of the defenders on the Capitals is becoming an issue. This issue centers around trusting younger players to play more high pressure minutes than they ever have before. This is something that Barry Trotz has been criticized about numerous times over his coaching career. In an admittedly small sample size we have seen Christian Djoos, when paired with Carlson, and Madison Bowey, when paired with Dmitry Orlov, perform with great success when it comes to shot attempt percentage and expected goal percentage. Orpik playing over 20 minutes five-on-five needs to stop and the Caps have pairings they could turn to, to make it stop.
Now that I have again complained about Orpik, it’s time to complain some more about the line of Alex Ovechkin, Evgeny Kuznetsov, and Devante Smith Pelly. The trio were again the worst combined line on the team when it comes to shot attempt differential five-on-five, with Ovechkin leading the charge at a minus-10. It seems to me that this line has no interest in playing defense whatsoever and there is a player who had a total of nine whole points last season playing to the right of Ovechkin and Kuznetsov. Joey Crabb had almost three times that amount of points (26) in his season prior to playing on that fateful Ovechkin and Jay Beagle line.
Chandler Stephenson added another assist to the two he had tallied against the Islanders only a few nights prior. The young forward now has four points in five games this season. He has earned an extended look on the team with the absence of Andre Burakovsky, but I do wonder how his role changes when Brett Connolly inevitably returns here in the short-term. One may hypothesize that sticking with this ever gelling third line and having Connolly replace DSP could return better results.
Tom Wilson recorded his first ever regular-season two-goal game. The charismatic enigma that is Wilson had a strong game and didn’t punch anyone in the face. Imagine that.
The Danish shining light of my dreams that is Lars Eller had yet another great hockey performance. Eller now has six points in his last four games and was one of three Caps to come in at even or better when it comes to five-on-five shot attempt differential, the other two being Bowey and Jakub Vrana. The three players who played the least minutes five-on-five you ask? Vrana, Bowey, and Eller. Seems to be an easy solution there.
Liam O’Brien got a lineup spot over Nathan Walker. He did nothing of note other than make me root for someone wearing number 87. Barry, why mate?
Peter Hassett, a much smarter and much wittier human than I, is posting the second rendition of this season’s Snapshot today. Don’t forget to check it out, you’ll gain more insight to how this season looks as a whole.