Game 41: Don't let Alex Ovechkin get to 500 goals

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After a feel good win against Dallas on Tuesday, where the Rangers played extremely well against a very talented team, the Washington Capitals come to town on an 8-1-1 streak in their last ten games. This team is white-hot right now and not showing any signs of slowing down. They are deep defensively, even without John Carlson today, are getting great goaltending from Braden Holtby, and have one of the more potent offenses in the league.

One of the storylines today will be Alex Ovechkin’s quest to get to 500 goals. He’s at 497 right now, and while it is unlikely he puts up a hat trick against Henrik Lundqvist, crazier things have happened. Even if the Rangers tame him, the Caps have oodles of weapons they can throw at their opponents. The stellar defensive game put forth on Tuesday night will need to become the rule, not the exception, for the Rangers to cool the Caps.

There’s also the fact that Washington absolutely dominated the first two games this season. Poor goaltending did the Caps in the first time, but they controlled that game from start to finish. They got better goaltending the second time, and embarrassed the Rangers thoroughly. Keeping it close would be nice.

What have they done lately?

The Caps are a solid possession team, but their numbers have been sub-50% lately. That’s likely a product of playing with a lead so much lately, but that dip into sub-45% territory is interesting. They’ve been on the rise lately, so it seems they’ve corrected whatever process issues they were having.

For the Rangers, they’ve been crawling back to respectable possession numbers, albeit slowly. The process has certainly improved and we’ve seen that translate on the ice. It’s a matter of consistency now.

pdo

The Rangers likely have their worst days behind them. That PDO crash was expected and very, very ugly. The Caps have seen a steady rise for a while, likely due to Holtby’s goaltending. That should come down a bit soon, but you never really know when it will. Holtby isn’t a .940 SV% goalie, but he’s still a top-five goalie in the league. The Caps are going to be an interesting team to watch when that PDO regression comes.

Caps Systems

Under Barry Trotz the Caps run a 1-1-3 lock or a 1-2-2 forecheck, which they use aggressively or conservatively depending on the game situation (e.g., puck location, the score, etc.). In the defensive zone, Trotz runs your standard zone defense. On special teams, the Caps employ a 1-3-1 power play, and a diamond/box hybrid penalty kill depending on puck location and opposition setup.

Caps Lines

Alex Ovechkin-Nicklas Backstrom-T.J. Oshie
Andre Burakovsky-Evgeny Kuznetsov-Justin Williams
Jason Chimera-Michael Latta-Tom Wilson
Brooks Laich-Mike Richards-Stanislav Galiev

Dmitry Orlov-Nate Schmidt
Karl Alzner-Matt Niskanen
Aaron Ness-Taylor Chorney

PP1: Ovechkin-Backstrom-Oshie-Johanssen-Niskanen
PP2: Kuznetsov-Burakovsky-Williams-Orlov-Niskanen

PK: Laich, Oshie, Wilson, Backstrom, Williams, Orpik, Niskanen, Alzner

Braden Holtby gets the start.

Rangers Lines

J.T. Miller–Derick Brassard–Mats Zuccarello
Jayson Megna–Derek Stepan–Rick Nash
Oscar Lindberg–Kevin Hayes–Jesper Fast
Tanner Glass–Dominic Moore–Viktor Stalberg