The Washington Capitals are on fire. They are now 9-2-1 in the month of December after downing the Jets 4-1 on Friday and have won nine of their last ten games overall.
Keep it groovin’, keep it movin’.
- I’m gonna preface this one by saying it’s maybe going to be a little content-lacking as it’s Christmas Eve and I was up all night doing Alex Ovechkin stuff. We’re gonna leave him out of this post but you can check out all of our coverage of his huge night on the site.
- The first forty minutes of this game was more of the five-on-five dominance we have grown accustomed to in recent weeks. The Caps out-attempted the Jets 36 to 19 and out-chanced them 19 to 8 in those two frames. The third period was not very good. Winnipeg was able to find seven high-danger chances and had the puck for the vast majority of the final twenty minutes. It didn’t matter though because the Caps had an absolute killer in net.
- Charlie Lindgren continued his recent fantastic play with a 25-save victory. He is now 8-1 in his nine December starts with a 1.89 goals-against average and a .933 save percentage. MoneyPuck says he added another 1.73 goals saved above expected in this game. He is now deadlocked with Darcy Kuemper at 4.1 goals saved above expected on the season. What a great duo.
Nic Dowd scores his eighth goal of the season to extend the Capitals' lead to 3-0. It marks Dowd's third goal in his last three games. Over his last six games, Dowd has recorded six points (4g, 2a).
— CapitalsPR (@CapitalsPR) December 24, 2022
- Sonny Milano got on the board again. He now has 16 points (5g, 11a) in just 23 games with the Caps this season. That’s a 57-point pace over a full 82-game season and all five of his goals plus seven of his assists have come at five-on-five. What a pickup. He should probably be playing more than 9:49 of ice time at five-on-five. The Caps with him on the ice in those minutes recorded six scoring chances and two high-danger chances. They also didn’t give up a single one of either to Winnipeg.
- Am I the only one who thinks Nicolas Aube-Kubel has been noticeably good recently? It feels like every shift he’s at least doing something to make you notice him. He was all over the scoresheet in this game with two shots on net, six shot attempts, three individual scoring chances, two individual high-danger chances, and a drawn penalty.
- Aliaksei Protas, Nic Dowd, and Garnet Hathaway are awesome. They get the toughest zone start percentages on the team and yet night in and night out produce ridiculously positive results. At five-on-five with them on the ice, the Caps out-attempted Winnipeg 14 to 2, out-scoring chanced them 10 to 1, and out-high danger chanced them 4 to 1. Light work.
Numbers thanks to Hockey-reference.com and NaturalStatTrick.com.
