Boston Bruins Coach Bruce Cassidy said after Game 3, “I think we have not been intimidated for one second by the physicality of their team.” Yea right is what I have to say.
The Washington Capitals are the fourth heaviest and seventh tallest team in the NHL. The Boston Bruins however are 20th for weight and 30th in height.
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When the Caps looked their best in this series is when they play a big forechecking game against their light-ended defense core. When the HDH (Carl Hagelin, Nic Dowd, Garnet Hathaway) does their usual cycle forecheck until they find a nice shot, they have looked like a top end line, while playing against arguably the most consistent line in the NHL, shutting them down as best as possible.
What we need to do, is make sure our physical forwards like, Tom Wilson, Anthony Mantha, Hathaway and Michael Raffl are spread out between our 4 lines to ensure a sense of physicality to create space for our skilled goal scorers.
A potential Evgeny Kuznetsov and Alex Ovechkin skill-set along with a body mover in Tom Wilson could create deadly chances. Ovechkin and Kuznetsov picking up pucks in the corner of Tom Wilson blowing someone up can create an abundance of chances for high percentage shots.
It doesn’t have to be Wilson on the top line, but I would like to see someone take the physical load for Ovechkin because if all goes as planned we will be needing his energy and physicality for a long playoff run.
I think we see the fear in even Bruce Cassidy’s quote that the Capitals really can take advantage of their substantially smaller team. Seeing the way the HDH line is dominating the offensive zone, with a constant forechecker on all four lines we can really put a bruising on their roster.