A seventh-round draft pick who isn’t particularly big, Christian Djoos is nonetheless a Stanley Cup Champion and the beacon for a bright future of the Caps blue line.
During an interview with Viasat in 2014, Nicklas Backstrom mused he would bring the Stanley Cup back to Gävle, Sweden. On August 12, that dream will become a reality when he has his day with the Stanley Cup.
Backstrom wants to share the Cup with as many people as possible and will take the championship trophy to Nickback Arena – the hometown rink named after him.
Hockey Graphs’ Ryan Stimson and Corey Sznajder have done an upsetting amount of manual data collection over the last few years. Building off foundational research by Sznajder, Eric Tulsky, Geoffrey Detweiler, Robert Spencer (PDF), and Jen LC, Sznajder and Stimson have been watching games to record information about tactics that just doesn’t exist in the standard NHL data sets that drive so-called “advanced stats” like shot-attempt percentage, expected goals, and PDO.
Stimson has published four years of data in an interactive application, called the Player Traits and Performance Comparison Tool. When I opened the tool, the first thing I did was look up some young Caps defensemen. What I found was fascinating.
The Stanley Cup Champions are on their way to National Park for a game against the Giants. Before they left Virginia, some players encountered a Caps fan wearing an RMNB The Djoos is Loose shirt.
They liked it, so they made a trade.
“He’s from Gävle, you know. Grumpy, like his dad.”
Capitals veteran star Nicklas Bäckström has taken Christian Djoos under his wing during his rookie season. And, when the young defenseman punched Golden Knights forward James Neal in the face, Bäckström had a good laugh.
Before the Capitals won their first ever Stanley Cup Final game on home ice, the team took a skate at Kettler Capitals Iceplex.
With a full house packed with fans, the Capitals looked loose and were having maybe the most fun they have had all season. The looseness might have gone the wrong way, when a Dmitry Orlov snapshot deflected up into the Capitals office windows. No one was hurt by the falling glass, but I am sure the window has been better days.
Thursday during the Capitals morning skate, Barry Trotz made one tweak to his lineup ahead of Game Four.
Jakub Vrana was demoted to the team’s fourth line while Chandler Stephenson, AKA Lil’ Steve, was promoted to the second line.
After watching his team fall in a 2-0 series hole against the Blue Jackets, Capitals head coach Barry Trotz is making changes, albeit subtle, to his lineup.
Washington Capitals head coach Barry Trotz is making several lineup changes ahead of the team’s game against the Ottawa Senators.
Goaltender Philipp Grubauer will earn the start a night after he relieved Braden Holtby against Buffalo. After another poor team effort on defense, Holtby scuffled, giving up four first period goals on 17 shots against the Columbus Blue Jackets. Holtby has given up 26 goals in parts of the last six games, with a record of 0-4-2. This will be Grubauer’s fourth start in the Caps’ last eight contests.
Trotz, it appears, will also make a surprising yet not really all that surprising change on defense to get the newly acquired Jakub Jerabek into the lineup.
From butt-slashes to whatever this is, Washington Capitals players have very elaborate and bizarre routines to get ready for games.
Now, via video from @JayAndDan, we learn that John Carlson gives Alex Ovechkin cup checks.
