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Still bad: numbers for the morning after

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The Washington Capitals are still a very bad hockey team right now. Since late December they’ve been barely a .500 club and that rough stretched continued Thursday night as they dropped a 4-3 decision to the Montreal Canadiens in overtime.

The shots at the end of the night were locked at 32, but the Habs out-attempted the Caps at five-on-five 58 to 44.

  • The Caps were just plain bad yet again. They’ve lost five of their last six overall, seven of their last ten, five of their last six at home, and are 11-11-1 since the December 23 loss to the Boston Bruins. The team was very lucky to escape with a standings point as Montreal really did whatever they wanted the whole game.
  • Braden Holtby was stellar yet again, making 28 stops. I bet he wants the overtime winner back, but he was also the only reason the Caps even got to overtime. It’s a damn shame that his play finally tuned up just as the Caps decided to absolutely suck at even strength.
  • Tom Wilson‘s late goal was nice to see. The Caps really need more production from guys like Wilson, Kuznetsov, Vrana, and Eller if they want to get out of this very bad patch of games. The goal was Willy’s 18th of the season.

  • Lars Eller hurt his old team yet again. Lars now has six goals (eight points overall) in only 12 games against his former mates.
  • The top pairing of John Carlson and Brenden Dillon was really an unmitigated disaster. They were on the ice for all three of the Habs regulation time goals. At five-on-five with Carlson on the ice, the Caps got out-attempted by 15, out-scoring chanced by nine, and out-high danger chanced by six.
  • Two games remain before the trade deadline. A date with the Devils on Saturday and then more action the next night against the Penguins. It’s gonna be an interesting few days, folks.

Numbers thanks to Hockey-reference.com and NaturalStatTrick.com.

Full RMNB Coverage of Caps vs Canadiens

Headline photo: NBC Sports Washington

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