It’s The Penalty Kill, Stupid
Will the Caps be able to overcome their PK woes in the playoffs? (AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari)
[Ed Note: With Peter galavanting in the middle of California for a wedding and Ian scrambling to keep up with all of the Barack The Red happenings, we’re not going to have a gamer tonight covering the Lightning’s 3-2 victory. Who wants to read more about that anyways? Not I. So tonight, we bring you something that has become a growing concern for the crew here at RMNB: the Capitals below average Penalty Kill. Will this do them in when the games really matter? What do you think? Read Neil’s article and let us know in the comments below.]
To misquote Yogi Berra, “95% of hockey is half defense.” Or more precisely, 58.3% defense according to Alan Ryder.
Now whether that is true or not remains to be seen, but what we do know is that goaltending is not the issue for the Caps going into the playoffs – it is their Penalty Killing (PK).
If we look at the teams that won The Cup since the 1979-80 season a distinct pattern emerges:
By 13 years ago
