Top 3 questions facing the Capitals in 2022
August is almost over and before we know it all the Washington Capitals players will be back in town gearing up for another season. There are several questions facing the team. So what are the top three?
There is still plenty of offseason left and the Caps might not be done. After all they’re a little bit in debt salary cap wise. So what will they do about that?
We already talked about Peter Laviolette so we don’t need to answer that in here but you can catch up on that here. What we will bring up here is the goaltending and another subject I don’t know about until later on when I write this.
#3 What will the Caps do about their salary cap situation?
Per Cap Friendly the Caps are $6,321,666 over the salary cap. There has to be a move coming soon. If not before training camp it could certainly come during training camp as the Caps have until opening night to get under the cap.
But who could possibly go. On the forward side of things only Alex Ovechkin and Evgeny Kuznetsov have a higher cap hit than six million and they’re not going anywhere. It could be one or two players for draft picks.
#2 Will the goaltending be an upgrade?
The question on every Caps fans mind is will the goaltending be improved this season compared to last season. On paper, the answer is yes.
Last season for the Capitals, Vitek Vanecek went 20-12-6 with a 2.67 goals against average and a .908 save percentage. It was his second straight year with a .908 save percentage.
Ilya Samsonov went 23-12-5 with a 3.02 goals against average and a .896 save percentage. Both the goals against average and the save percentage were career worsts. The Caps said goodbye to both of them.
Vanecek is now on the New Jersey Devils while Samsonov is on the Toronto Maple Leafs.
In their place in Darcy Kuemper who helped win a Stanley Cup with the Colorado Avalanche. In the regular season he went 37-12-4 with a 2.54 goals against average and a .921 save percentage. In the playoffs he went 10-4 with a 2.57 goals against average and a .902 save percentage.
The Caps also acquired Charlie Lindgren to backup Kuemper. Last season with the St. Louis Blues he went 5-0-0 with a 1.22 goals against average and a .958 save percentage.
On paper that’s a significant upgrade. A veteran net minder paired with a slightly younger goaltender is better than riding it out with two rookies like the Caps did the last two years.
#1 Can the Caps keep up with the improved Metropolitan Division?
The biggest question facing the Caps this season is can a team that just got older by another year keep up with the young, fast and always improved Metropolitan Division?
Last year the New York Rangers went on a deep playoff run and nearly were the ones to dethrone the Tampa Bay Lightning. Instead it was the Colorado Avalanche and Darcy Kuemper that did it in the Finals.
Out of teams that got better this season I see the New Jersey Devils making some noise and sliding into one of those playoff spots. It seemed like they were a year or two away in the middle of the pandemic and now that two year period is up.
Of course you also got to watch out for the Carolina Hurricanes who are the Capitals opponents outside in the Stadium Series. The Pittsburgh Penguins will never go away. And then there’s a pesky team that will sneak in that we didn’t even mention here.
Related Story. Breaking down the top prospects on the Capitals. light
It’s that improved and it’ll be a big challenge for the Capitals. They will have to match the speed of that Metropolitan Division and make sure they don’t take any of their opponents lightly.