There’s never much love when we go OT: numbers for the morning after

October 6, 2019 6:50 am

The Washington Capitals dropped their first game of the season at home to the Carolina Hurricanes in overtime. After starting off the season with two wins, the Caps couldn’t stave off a third period Carolina comeback, leading to the eventual 3-2 overtime winner.

The Caps out-shot the Canes 35 to 28 and out-attempted them at five-on-five 44 to 31.

The big story of this game was the Caps power play looking like an utter joke. The unit was 0-for-6 on the night and has been an issue for this team for over a season worth of games at this point, including being a major factor in the series loss to these same Hurricanes. The coaching staff has seemingly changed nothing, yet expect different results. Captain, the new team pup, should be hired to coach the man advantage because at this point he’d do better. This loss is entirely due to the non conversion of many attempts, including even one in overtime.
Now at five-on-five though? Same story as the first two games, the Caps looked excellent even in a back-to-back against a team that usually thoroughly dominates even strength play. The Caps were the clear better team for me in this regard, finding 58.7-percent of the shot attempts. That is a fantastic sign.
Braden Holtby was spectacular early on as the Caps took a few minutes to get into this one. Holts stopped 25 of 28 on the night and might want that overtime winner that beat him shortside back.

Garnet Hathaway scores his first goal as a Capital to give Washington a 1-0 lead over Carolina.

— CapitalsPR (@CapitalsPR) October 5, 2019

Brendan Leipsic picked up an assist, his first career point as a Capital.

— CapitalsPR (@CapitalsPR) October 5, 2019

Maybe a relief to the maligned power play will be the return of Evgeny Kuznetsov. Number 92 now making a return after his three game suspension will surely help the seemingly hapless zone entry strategy as he is sometimes a one man breakout. I really, really hope we get a good, dominant Kuzy this year and that last year was a fluke in terms of his even strength play.
Just another dog bullet. Your number here is number one, because Captain is the number one pup.
I hope the Canes lose the rest of their games.

Headline Photo: NBC Sports Washington