The Washington Capitals lost their fifth straight game in a row and are now in full free fall mode in the Eastern Conference standings. The Chicago Blackhawks 8-5 win over the Caps is perhaps just the exclamation point for some on a stretch of hockey that no one is very proud of.
The Caps out-shot the Blackhawks 39 to 30 and out-attempted them at five-on-five 52 to 49.
- Hoo-boy, that all star break and bye week cant come any sooner. This is the first five-game losing streak the Capitals have had since the very first months of the Barry Trotz administration in 2014.
- Neither of the Caps goalies were very good in this game (Copley much worse), but they didn’t have a ton of help from the Caps defense either. Madison Bowey should never be playing over Jonas Siegenthaler, Brooks Orpik is done folks, and Dmitry Orlov and Matt Niskanen are handing out opponent goals at five-on-five like banks give out free lollipops.
- I personally think the Caps need a move or two on the trade front, but with two extended breaks coming up soon, I wonder if Brian MacLellan would rather standpat and let his guys figure this out themselves. Adding Michal Kempny last season was a huge boost.
- Orpik scored a goal at even strength which gave him more five-on-five goals this season than Evgeny Kuznetsov. That’s a massive yikes.
- All five of the Caps goals were scored by defensemen.
Numbers thanks to Hockey-reference.com, NaturalStatTrick.com, and Corsica.hockey.
Full RMNB Coverage of Caps at Blackhawks
Headline photo: Chase Agnello-Dean
