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An absolute mauling of the Montreal Canadiens: numbers for the morning after

By Chris Cerullo

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January 1, 2023 8:48 am

The Washington Capitals responded to their bad overtime loss to the Ottawa Senators with an absolute mauling of the Montreal Canadiens on Saturday night. The fans wanted ten but had to “settle” for a 9-2 victory on home ice.

Happy New Year!

  • When you win a game 9-2 the five-on-five stats from the game don’t really matter so we’re kinda just going to skip that normal bullet here. Nine goals were a season-high for the Caps and the last time they put a nine spot on a team came last season on April 12 against the Philadelphia Flyers. The Caps had eight different goal scorers in that game and “just” seven in this one.
  • The main reason for that “just” seven is that Alex Ovechkin recorded the 30th hat trick of his NHL career. Ovi’s 30 hat tricks are the sixth-most in NHL history behind only Wayne Gretzky (50), Mario Lemieux (40), Mike Bossy (39), Brett Hull (33), and Phil Esposito (32). At 37 years old, Ovi is now currently on pace for a 54-goal, 94-point season.
  • I actually didn’t really think the top line played that well at all five-on-five. Ovi scored his first goal playing four-on-four with Lars Eller, his second goal on the power play, and his third goal with a moment of sheer individual brilliance. In fact, somehow in a 9-2 game the Caps ended up with negative differentials in shot attempts (-10), scoring chances (-4), and high-danger chances (-6) with Evgeny Kuznetsov on the ice at five-on-five. Ovi and Kuzy just do not work defensively at all at this stage of their careers. Peter Laviolette would be wise to put Dylan Strome back with The Great Eight.

  • We have to talk about Erik Gustafsson. What an absolute gem of a find from Brian MacLellan is he turning out to be. He had three points in the game (1g, 2a) for his third three-point game of the season. He is currently riding a seven-game point streak and has 13 points (6g, 7a) in those seven games. At five-on-five with him on the ice this season, the Caps own 54.3-percent of the shot attempts, 53.6-percent of the expected goals, 54.9-percent of the scoring chances, and 52.6-percent of the high-danger chances. Over the past 20 games, the team has a plus-7 goal differential at five-on-five with him on the ice. A complete turnaround from his very weak early-season results.
  • Charlie Lindgren was excellent yet again in his return to the starter’s net. Chuck made 31 stops in his eighth victory in the month of December. MoneyPuck had him at 1.31 goals saved above expected in the contest.
  • Martin Fehervary played 18 minutes in his return from a 12-game absence due to injury. He picked up an assist, took a penalty, drew a penalty, blocked a shot, and threw one hit in his return game. I thought he looked good overall.

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

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