The Washington Capitals needed a win against the Philadelphia Flyers on Tuesday night to qualify for the 2024 postseason and they got it. The 2-1 scoreline wasn’t fun for us nail-biters at home but they ultimately got the job done and we’ll see playoffs in DC which is not something we can expect from too many of the city’s teams these days.
Bring on the Rangers.
- The Capitals really didn’t play all that well in this game outside of the first period but they closed up shop around Charlie Lindgren well enough to eke out another one-goal victory. They only recorded 18 total shots in the win and put together just three high-danger chances in the last forty minutes combined. I’m not too pressed though, playoffs baby.
- Spencer Carbery went with Charlie Lindgren on back-to-back days and his goaltender rewarded him with two stellar outings. In the final two games of the regular season, Lindgren went 2-0 with a 0.50 goals-against average and a .977 save percentage. Ch ch ch cha-ching.
- Alex Ovechkin scored the lone goal for the Capitals that actually needed to beat a goaltender to go in. The marker was the 853rd of Ovi’s illustrious career, leaving him 41 goals behind Wayne Gretzky at the start of next season. Go get 45 next year, big fella.
In his first season as head coach, Spencer Carbery led the Capitals to a playoff berth with a record of 40-31-11 (91 points). That's an 11-point improvement from last season (35-37-10, 80 points).
— CapitalsPR (@CapitalsPR) April 17, 2024
- John Carlson played over 29 minutes on back-to-back nights. The Capitals’ top defenseman basically skated an entire game’s worth of ice time. He still has a questionable play or two in his game but I still think he’s so underappreciated and will obviously leave a gigantic hole on this team whenever he calls it quits.
- The Capitals went 2-2 against the Rangers this season. Both teams scored nine goals in the four games. Oh boy, would it feel so nice to ruin their lives this year as the underdogs with no expectations like they’ve done countless times to the Capitals in the past? Yes, yes, it would.
- Do we see Ryan Leonard sign with the Capitals today? I sure hope so. My actual prediction will be that he goes back to school for another year though but he would legitimately help the Capitals now. For the unaware, Leonard set a new freshman goal-scoring record at Boston College this past season. His 31 goals bested a mark set by Brian Gionta (30) back in 1997-98.
Numbers thanks to Hockey-reference.com and NaturalStatTrick.com.
