The Washington Capitals, who are playing with what feels like about a fourth of their regular roster, fell 3-2 to the Los Angeles Kings at home.
It was an entirely avoidable loss even given the circumstances. Let’s talk about why but I have a feeling you already know why.
- From a pure five-on-five perspective, the Capitals dominated the puck in this game. They out-attempted LA 45 to 32, out-shot them 26 to 17, and out-scoring chanced them 21 to 12. The issue, which is probably an obvious one, is that they just didn’t create enough “slam dunk” chances and that’s just what happens when you’re missing Evgeny Kuznetsov, Nicklas Backstrom, TJ Oshie, Tom Wilson, and Anthony Mantha all at the exact same time. The Caps had a ton of the puck but only created four high danger chances at five-on-five in the game. You cant be missing almost two entire top-six lines and just power through that forever.
- Even with that being said, this game was lost on the power play. A big ole 0-for-6 with a man advantage that was really more like a negative one-for-six given the shorthanded goal allowed. Blaine Forsythe has the same built-in excuse that I gave above for the lack of creativity, but this is a power play that has clearly been out of whack long before those dudes came out of the lineup. The Caps now have the fifth-worst power play in the league and it’s obviously going in the wrong direction and has been for what feels like two or three years. It’s time for a new set of eyes but that feels like just banging a muted drum at this point.
- Alex Ovechkin led the Caps in ice time, playing almost half the game at 27:24. His 16 shot attempts in the game are tied for the most he’s fired in a game this season. He had only three total individual scoring chances and zero individual high danger chances. The Kings did a good job on him defensively and the Caps just don’t have the center to pair with him right now to set him up for much better.
Joe Snively has become the first player from the state of Virginia to play for the Washington Capitals tonight.
— CapitalsPR (@CapitalsPR) December 20, 2021
- Joe Snively recorded his first NHL point in his debut. He played a little less than seven minutes as his line suffered from the excess amount of special teams time in the game.
- Speaking of which, Connor McMichael played the least amount on the entire team at 6:18. In those sparse minutes, he was still able to score a goal, fire three shots on net which was the most from any Caps forward not named Ovechkin, record three individual scoring chances which was tied for the lead among forwards, and record two individual high danger chances which was also tied for the lead among forwards. I think the way McMichael has been treated of late in terms of ice time is a joke. With how many offensive pieces are out right now his role should be the largest it has ever been, not the smallest. This is starting to feel like a coach picking on a player that he “thinks” doesn’t do enough for him defensively when in reality the player actually is one of his best at pushing the pace offensively (Jakub Vrana, Andre Burakovsky). Your power play is utter trash and you have a player that seemingly creates chances every time he’s on the ice five-on-five sit on the bench while guys like Garnet Hathaway, Michael Sgarbossa, and literal defensemen playing forward get more of a chance with a man up than McMichael. It’s borderline self-sabotage at this point, in my honest opinion. I guess it’s an “earn it” (he scored a goal within the first 10 minutes of the game by the way) or “teach a lesson” type coaching thing, but it’s also 2021 and we should be better than that and know that that crap is relatively useless. The dude has led his team’s, including Hershey last season, in scoring everywhere he has gone. Come the f-bomb on. End rant.
- You know what, I’m gonna stay on this for a second. Do you know who leads the Caps this season in shots per 60 minutes at five-on-five? Connor McMichael. Individual expected goals per 60? McMichael. Individual scoring chances per 60? Same dude. Individual high danger chances per 60? You get the point. The argument will be, “Well, why doesn’t he score more then?” The answer is stupid, dumb puck luck. He has scored at every single level and his shot is one of his main strengths as you saw in this very game. If he plays more, he’ll score more. Especially, maybe if he gets more than 0.00 seconds of power play time and a gosh darn bounce or two in his favor.
Numbers thanks to Hockey-reference.com and NaturalStatTrick.com.
