The Washington Capitals have finished first in the Eastern Conference two years in a row, but a TSN Hockey analyst is predicting their regular-season dominance might be coming to an end.
In an article on TSN.ca, Travis Yost points out the offseason losses of Marcus Johansson, Justin Williams, Nate Schmidt, Kevin Shattenkirk and Karl Alzner.
Yost states Washington believes they can replace the majority of players they lost this offseason internally, but points out the Capitals may have other issues to worry about.
He notes how Washington’s usually dominant power play took a step backwards last season and it’s hard to determine how great they really were at even strength.
Yost points out Washington had a +66 goal differential at 5-on-5, which is extraordinarily high. He’s concerned because you’d expect Washington to have dominated games territorially, but they only had 52 per cent of the scoring chances last season.
Yost feels the Capitals are a very good team, but it isn’t very reasonable to expect a team to continue scoring on one of every 11 shots.
Playoff struggles aside, the Capitals have long been a team known for dominating the regular season, but a step backwards in 2017-18 is very possible.
