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Yes please, more of that: numbers for the morning after

By Chris Cerullo

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February 26, 2020 7:00 am

In their first, very close to complete effort in a long time the Washington Capitals took down the Winnipeg Jets 4-3 in a shootout. The post trade deadline portion of the schedule is off to a great start.

The Caps out-shot the Jets 37 to 33, but were out-attempted at five-on-five 59 to 54.

  • That’s the best the Caps have played in literal months. Screw the Jets comeback, that was fueled by some garbage bounces, horrible ice, and some bad luck. Through forty minutes, the Caps at five-on-five had 23 scoring chances to the Jets 14 and 14 high danger chances to the Jets four. Without some opposing goaltending brilliance and some bad shooting luck, this game could have easily been at least 6-1 after two periods. Very happy with this effort and the full two points.
  • It took Alex Ovechkin less than two minutes to crown his 700th goal celebration night with the 701st goal of his career. GOAT stays GOAT.
  • I thought Ilya Kovalchuk and the third line looked brilliant for most of Kovy’s first game in red. It doesn’t show up in the numbers too well, but I loved what I saw from the trio. Kovy looks to still have more than enough jump skating wise, fantastic hands, his trademark lethal shot, willingness to get physical, and moments of individual offensive brilliance/intelligence that I think the team could definitely use more of.

  • Evgeny Kuznetsov was another easy standout. With number 92 on the ice at five-on-five the Caps grabbed eight high danger chances to the Jets two. Kuzy was very unlucky to only come away with one point on the evening. It has been far too long since we’ve seen that kind of stuff from him.
  • Second game in a row that I thought Brenden Dillon was probably the best Caps defenseman. Dillon and John Carlson had the Scheifele, Wheeler, Connor assignment all night and dominated the dynamic Winnipeg trio. With Dillon out there at five-on-five the Caps grabbed 62.2-percent of the shot attempts (plus-11 differential), 81.3-percent of the scoring chances (plus-10 differential), and 83.3-percent of the high danger chances (plus-four differential).
  • Braden Holtby stays hot, making 30 stops and a few more to seal things in the shootout. Cant blame him for any of the Jets goals. Really good stuff of late from Holts.

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

Full RMNB Coverage of Caps vs Jets

Headline photo: NBC Sports Washington

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