The Washington Capitals took both halves of their Metropolitan Division back-to-back this weekend and will come home with a 6-1-1 record over their last eight games. The New York Islanders were their latest victims in a 4-1 victory on Saturday night.
They don’t have to all be pretty and this one sure wasn’t.
- The Capitals did not have a ton of the puck in this game as the Islanders tossed 95 shot attempts their way and hit Hunter Shepard or the back of the net 37 times. At five-on-five the scoring chance battle was also ugly as New York recorded 39 to the Capitals’ 16. But, despite the quantity, the tired Capitals were able to limit quality enough to come out of the 60 minutes tied in overall high-danger chances 12 to 12. In the back half of a back-to-back against a team that doesn’t have a ton of high-powered, offensive talent like the Islanders, you’ll definitely take that.
- Hunter Shepard was pretty damn good though. The first-year netminder stopped 36 shots in his second career NHL start and second career NHL victory. According to Money Puck, the 28 year old saved 1.72 more goals than expected which is a great outing. After a rocky first period, I thought he really settled down and dominated the back half of the game.
- Alex Ovechkin finally grabbed goals number three and four of his season. The Great Eight now trails Wayne Gretzky by just 68 goals and is now tied with The Great One in terms of career empty netters (56). More please, Alex.
Since defeating the New Jersey Devils 6-4 on Oct. 25, Washington’s .813 point percentage ranks tied for third in the NHL.
— CapitalsPR (@CapitalsPR) November 12, 2023
- Safe to say that fatigue was probably on display for John Carlson after he played literally half of the game on Friday night. With Carlson on the ice at five-on-five on Saturday, the Capitals were out-attempted 52 to 12, out-scoring chanced 22 to 4, and out-high danger chanced 6 to 3. Carlson ended up with another 26 minutes of ice time and isn’t exactly a spring chicken anymore. I get there are injury issues on the backend but the Capitals have to be wary of burning out their big gun on the backend.
- The “new” fourth line of Beck Malenstyn, Nic Dowd, and Nicolas Aube-Kubel had what I thought was another great game. That trio now has six points (3g, 3a) in their two games together. Individually, Malenstyn blocked six shots on his own, Dowd won 13 of his 22 faceoffs, and Aube-Kubel now has three points in his two total games this season.
- With the victory, the old, banged-up Capitals are now sitting in a playoff spot in the Eastern Conference as the third place team in the Metropolitan Division. They are just two points back of the Carolina Hurricanes for second place and have two games in hand on them.
Numbers thanks to Hockey-reference.com and NaturalStatTrick.com.
