November 23 vs. New Jersey Devils at Capital One Arena
Time: 7:00 p.m.
TV: MNMT
Radio: 99.1 FM, Caps Radio 24/7
Washington Capitals (13-6-1)
Florida Panthers (12-8-1)
With their entourage nearly doubled for the next four days, the Capitals are off to Florida ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday. A large contingent of fathers, brothers, fathers-in-law and mentors are along for the journey to the Sunshine State for the team’s annual Mentors’ Trip.
The first stop is Sunrise, where the Caps open the two-game trip against the defending Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers on Monday night. The Caps return home just in time for the holiday following a Wednesday night encounter with the Lightning in Tampa.
For the first time this season, the Caps will enter Monday’s game lugging a two-game losing streak; they lost both games of a two-game homestand, falling by a single goal in regulation time in each. Now they’ll aim to get back in the win column against an elite Florida team that has lost three straight games.
With captain Alex Ovechkin (broken fibia) out of the lineup for the first time this season, the Caps managed to score just three goals on the two-game homestand, falling 2-1 to Colorado on Thursday and 3-2 to New Jersey on Saturday night. Although they’ve scored just two even-strength goals in their last two games, the Caps still lead the League in that department with 61 goals at 5-on-5, four more than Vegas (57), which has played one more game.
After the loss to Colorado, Caps’ coach Spencer Carbery stressed the need for his team to control play more at 5-on-5. That mission was accomplished against New Jersey, but now the Caps need to be more productive with their forays into the offensive zone.
“Get shots through, right? I mean, that's an easy one,” says Carbery. “[New Jersey] had 28 blocks [Saturday] night. So there's a simple one. Do a better job [at] two things that I looked at this morning: Executing in tight areas. We had some opportunities to make some plays, and we just didn't, for whatever reason, whether it was awareness, knowing that there was an option available, whether it was a missed pass, sloppy with a touch. So there's that.
“And then I think we can just do a better job of being a little bit hungrier and a little bit harder on the interior of the rink, especially with our forwards. I would say it's not a strong suit of a lot of our forward group, but they're going to have to get comfortable doing a better job of that, of being hard, heavy, being able to score a secondary rebound, fight over a six-foot-three defenseman and win space. And that's hard to do in this league, but that's required if A) you're going to win hockey games and B) if you're going to score goals.”
Much of their offensive zone work was on the perimeter in the first 40 minutes of the New Jersey game, and once they did begin to squeeze the Devils in their own end, their shot selection and decision making wasn’t always on point. But there also has to be a concerted effort to get to the interior on a more consistent basis.
“To be honest,” begins Caps’ center Dylan Strome, “I feel like in the third periods we have [gotten to the interior]. But in the first two periods of both the games [on the homestand], I felt like we didn't do enough to get to the inside. We were probably playing a little bit too conservative, not wanting to give up goals, and I feel like the strength of our team has been finding ways to get a lead and build on a lead.
“We had the lead in both the last two games; we just haven't found a way to continue and build on the lead. It’s like we get one goal and then we're trying to sit back a little, whereas the first 15 games, we're pressing, we're pressing, we're pressing, and we're making the other team uncomfortable and getting to the inside in the first and second and third.
“But for the most part, we’ve sat back the last two games, and we sat back too much after we got the 1-0 lead.”
The Caps know they can’t expect to score five or six goals nightly, but they also realize they’ve got to do better than one or two goals a night if they’re going to win consistently. Their goaltending and defense are both better than last season, when getting to three goals was a nightly struggle.
“I just think guys have to make plays in the end,” says Caps’ center Nic Dowd. “If we set ourselves up with [offensive] zone time, and we have a good change, and say we are controlling play for 45 seconds, their [defensemen] are tired. You have to be calculated on where you waste that puck, right? Like, when do you shoot it? When do you not shoot it? When do you rim it? Do you skate? Where do you skate?
“I just think our forwards and our [defensemen] just have to be better at making plays, quite honestly. Earlier in the year when we were scoring goals, we were just finishing on those plays; we were making good on the 3-on-2s, the 2-on-1s and the breakaways, the extended zone time, and stuff like that. We just didn't do that [Saturday] night. I think we had opportunities, but to get to high dangerous scoring areas, I also think we need to do a better job of trying to have secondary opportunities, like right in front of the net.
“It seems like a lot of our stuff is shoot, rebound, spray into the corner. And if you don't get the puck, or if you shoot and they grab it, our guys aren't working enough for each other to get that sustained [offensive] zone time. The opportunities where you’re going to score, are like shot, rebound, or high slot, shot, rebound, bang it in.”
The Panthers roared out of the starting gates with an 11-3-1 record this season, but they’ve dropped five of six games since, yielding four or more goals against in four of the five losses. Florida’s current three-game regulation slide is its first since March 14-21 of this year.
Florida still boasts a bevy of top offensive talents, and the Panthers rank sixth in the circuit with an average of 3.48 goals per game. But the Cats have yielded nearly as many themselves – an average of 3.43 goals against per game – and that lands them at 27th in the League.
Despite their recent travails, the Panthers are only a point back of Toronto for the Atlantic Division lead, though the Leafs hold a game in hand.
