Is The Washington Capitals Game Starting To Get A Little Sick?

The Washington Capitals have been on a roll for well over a month now. After a rough start where the team spent the majority of their time out of a playoff position, this roll is exactly what the doctor ordered.

Since the 23rd of November the Capitals are 12-3-1. That gives them a total of 25 points since then. Only the Carolina Hurricanes have more points in that time with 26. Since the rough start everything has been going well.

Some players have come off the injured list, albeit others have joined it as well. The team has started to score a bunch of goals, they have improved defensively and they have gotten good goaltending. On the ice, there has not been that much to complain about. They are on a roll.

When a team is on a roll I always think back to a quote Todd McLellan, then the head coach of the San Jose Sharks, said. Forgive me, as I cannot remember the exact quote, but it went a little something like this. “A teams game will get the sniffles before it goes fully sick.”

It’s an easy enough concept to understand. Teams don’t often go from being on a hot streak to instantly being on a bad streak without showing signs. Just like you don’t suddenly become sick. You usually notice the annoying little things first, like the sniffles or a scratchy throat, or something like that.

Over the past few games, have we seen the Capitals start to show some sniffles? It’s easy enough to dismiss isn’t it? Over the period we will talk about the Capitals are 2-0-2 with a big win vs a division rival in their building in New York and a “dominating” win vs the Canadiens 9-2. Talking about a team struggling would be ridiculous.

Over the past few games though I think there are some things that could hint that this roll that the team is on could be coming to an end. What does that mean? Who knows. Instead of going 12-3-1 over a stretch maybe they go 9-5-2. Maybe they fall  back to just being a .500 team and go 7-7-2. I don’t know, I’m not a fortune teller.

While the Capitals have been winning or getting points recently, they have not been playing as well as they had been during this good run. The numbers will back up this thought.

From the 23rd of November to Christmas the Capitals numbers looked like this.

CF% – 51.24%

SCF% – 53.50%

HDCF% – 55.83%

xGF% – 55.88%

All of those are good numbers, some of them creeping into the very good category.

Now lets take a look at their numbers since the Christmas or holiday break.

CF% – 46.70%

SCF% – 48.26%

HDCF% – 45.78%

xGF% – 51.54%

I’m not someone who is great with numbers, but how the Capitals have a expected goals for percentage above 50% with the scoring chances and high danger attempts numbers so low is something I don’t understand. On the bright side the that number is still pretty good with the other numbers taking a pretty big dive.

Those are the numbers, but the eye test also says they are not playing as well. Puck management being something that has been up and down since the break. Some periods it has been good, others it hasn’t. The bad having no better example than vs the Senators where Kuznetsov had two bad giveaways that led to the tying goals and winning goal.

On top of the numbers going down the Capitals have not really played a lot of great teams during this post Christmas break stretch. They played the Rangers on the 27th and had a convincing win. That was the best win of this stretch, in my opinion. After that it was Ottawa, Montreal and Buffalo.

Every team has things they do well, a couple of those teams have also been playing well as of late, but at the end of the day those teams are likely not playoff teams and the Capitals had trouble with all of them before doing something they did a lot a few years ago. Play average hockey for a large part of the game then turn it on late, dominate for a small part of the game and walk away winners.

They did this during the Montreal win. That was an even game if the Habs didn’t have a small advantage even. Then the third period starts, the Capitals dominate, they score a ton of goals and that win looks a lot more impressive than it was. The most recent game vs the Sabres was a lot of the same. Buffalo was playing well, even controlling the game before the Caps turned it on past the midway point of the game. They were down 3-1, started playing well and turned that into a 4-3 game early in the third period.

Again, no disrespect to these teams. But these teams are not Boston, Carolina, Toronto, etc. That’s not to say the Caps can’t beat those teams as well. They maybe, or probably can.

I still think the question needs to be asked. The Capitals have been playing very good hockey for over a month. Are we starting to see the fall of this good stretch?