The Washington Capitals have finally won a game that has gone past 60 minutes as they took down the Anaheim Ducks 4-3 in a shootout. Carl Hagelin has also finally scored his first goal of the season.
Did someone sacrifice a goat or something?
- I thought this was a pretty even, back-and-forth game. Probably a little too back-and-forth for any head coach’s liking but it made for an entertaining hockey game. After a second period surge from the Ducks, the Caps really shut the game down in the third and coasted into overtime. Normally this season that’s not very smart but they were able to buck that overtime and shootout trend and grab the two points. Almost all of Anaheim’s offense came from that Trevor Zegras line that felt like they were going to score twenty times. With that trio on the ice at five-on-five, the Ducks created five high danger chances. No other line of theirs had more than two.
- I’ve really missed watching TJ Oshie for the past handful of weeks. The Caps have yet to lose when he records a point this season (5-0-0). After Evgeny Kuznetsov (24:13) and Alex Ovechkin (23:25), Osh played most of any Caps forward (21:43). The team is just better with number 77 in the lineup.
- Ilya Samsonov picked up win number 11 to give him an 11-1-1 record this season. Sammy made 31 stops on 34 shots and among goaltenders with at least ten starts, he has crept into the top half of the league in both save percentage (.916) and goals-against average (2.42).
Players over the last 25 seasons (1996-97 to present) with 20+ goals and 20+ assists in their team's first 26 games of a season:
Jaromir Jagr (1999-2000)
Daniel Alfredsson (2005-06)
Leon Draisaitl (2021-22)
Alex Ovechkin (2021-22 via a 1st period helper for the @Capitals tonight) pic.twitter.com/kVJzSNSoh0— StatsCentre (@StatsCentre) December 7, 2021
- It took Ovi only 26 games to hit the 40-point mark after his two assists in this game gave him 41 on the season. That’s the quickest he has hit 40 points in his career. His previous best was 28 games in the 2009-10 season that saw him score 50 goals and record 109 total points in just 72 games played.
- I haven’t really mentioned Justin Schultz at all this season because TVR is usually the receiver of my praise on that pairing but I thought Schultz was good in this game. He grabbed the primary assist on Tom Wilson’s 100th career goal. The Caps had a plus-six shot attempt differential and a plus-three scoring chance differential with that third pairing out five-on-five.
- Ovi had 16 individual shot attempts in this game and didn’t score. That’s very rare. Let’s hope he gets a couple against the Pens.
Numbers thanks to Hockey-reference.com and NaturalStatTrick.com.
