Washington Capitals

What the Quant Says

263 goals from a club that is 9th in even-strength creation and 20th in chance share — better in the aggregate than in the possession, and 6.7 goals above expectation, 12th.

Alex Ovechkin is 41 years old, played all 82 games, and scored 32 goals on 244 shots, reaching 929 for his career. Tom Wilson scored 30 with 117 penalty minutes at the 86th percentile — the best on-ice rate on the club. Aliaksei Protas is 6-6 and 250 pounds and scored 25. Dylan Strome put up 58 points taking half his shots from inside 20 feet. Ryan Leonard scored 20 at 21.

Alex Tuch arrives from Buffalo with 33 goals and plus-24; Anthony Beauvillier takes 53 per cent of his shots from inside 20. It is a deep, heavy, competent attack without a dominant possession forward in it.

What the Scout Says

Size that can score, which is the rarest thing in hockey. Tom Wilson's shot chart is very good and it sits underneath a game built on intimidation. Alex Tuch does high volume from fair ice with a real playmaking rate alongside it. Aliaksei Protas occupies space and controls pucks rather than punishing people, and has improved by 10 goals in each of the last 2 seasons. Alex Ovechkin's release from the left circle has not changed in 21 years and there is no report to write about it.

The distribution comes from 2 centres who both stand 6-4. Dylan Strome is a genuine playmaker in his fourth straight season above 35 assists, and setting up Ovechkin has been a large part of his job. Pierre-Luc Dubois has never had his ability questioned and has had his compete questioned at 3 of 4 stops, which is a long enough pattern to note. The speed comes from elsewhere: Jordan Kyrou beats defencemen wide almost at will and does not use the speed to get inside, with no forechecking, no wall work and no net-front game whatsoever; Ethen Frank is among the fastest skaters in the league and that pace is the only way a small undrafted winger gets to the interior at all. Ryan Leonard is the one who arrived with everything intact — a heavy shot, a forecheck with intent, and checks he finishes.

What the Quant Says

27th in even-strength expected goals against, which is the number this club's record most contradicts. Jakob Chychrun scored 26 goals from the blue line in 23:20 a night — and posted the 51st percentile, with the chances 68.7 to 67.8 against him.

Matt Roy took 20:37 at the 33rd percentile and 12 penalty minutes across 79 games. Martin Fehérváry was plus-15 at the 43rd. Rasmus Sandin came out at exactly 50 per cent. No defenceman here reached the 52nd percentile.

John Carlson has gone to Tampa and Trevor van Riemsdyk to Pittsburgh; Vincent Desharnais arrives from San Jose. This is a middling blue line whose goals-against column was rescued from behind.

What the Scout Says

Mobile, skilled and physically thin. Jakob Chychrun has one of the two or three heaviest shots from any blue line in the league and the best goal total at the position in this edition, and the skating is genuinely good enough to carry 23 minutes. Martin Fehérváry's job is the retrieval and the first pass, and his skating is good for his size, which is why he can take 19 minutes against top lines.

After those 2 it gets light. Rasmus Sandin is a puck-mover who cannot clear a crease and is moved off his own net front routinely, with the skating covering a great deal of it and not all. Timothy Liljegren's first pass is still the best part of him, the offence never arrived, and the defensive reads have been the criticism at 3 organisations. Matt Roy is honest and unremarkable. The counterweight is 1 man: Vincent Desharnais is 6-7, clears his crease, blocks shots and takes 68 penalty minutes doing it, and speed beats him wide. In a series against a club with a big net-front forward, he plays — which is another way of saying nobody else here can do that job.

What the Quant Says

The best in the league, and it is not close. Washington's goaltending came in 28.9 goals better than the chances faced — first of 32, 7 clear of Colorado in second.

It is essentially 1 man. Logan Thompson took 58 games, faced 1,587 shots and stopped .9118. Charlie Lindgren played 21 and stopped .8787 — a difference of 33 points of save percentage on the same defence.

A 26th-ranked defensive team conceding 244 goals is Thompson's doing and nobody else's. It is also the least repeatable thing in this edition: a club whose entire margin sits on one goaltender's rate is one injury or one ordinary season away from a very different record.

What the Scout Says

The most complete dependence on 1 player in this edition. Logan Thompson is not spectacular in any respect and everything about the style is repeatable — square, patient, economical — and the rebound control is the most improved part of him and the thing that turned a good backup into this. His route to the position is one of the least likely in this book.

Charlie Lindgren is square and calm and does not steal games. Undrafted, a career backup, twice very good for half a season and never for a full one. The gap between the 2 of them is the most consequential in the league, and this club's entire margin sits on one man's rate — which is the least repeatable arrangement any team in this edition has.

What the Quant Says

12th at 7.22 expected goals per 60, on 4:50 a night, 16th. Slightly above median in both — a functional unit rather than a weapon.

Chychrun led it with 8 power-play goals from the point, Wilson 7, Tuch 7 elsewhere, Strome 6, Ovechkin 5. That Ovechkin at 41 is no longer the power play is the quiet story of this section, and that it still rates twelfth without him is the encouraging half of it.

What the Scout Says

Still built around the most productive weapon in the history of the sport, and now with more than one way to use it. Alex Ovechkin's office is unchanged and so is what happens when the puck reaches it. Dylan Strome has spent 4 years feeding him and is the setup man on the unit. Jakob Chychrun is the second shot from the point and one of the heaviest in the league, which is what stops a kill from committing entirely to one side.

The net front is the best-staffed part of it. Tom Wilson and Aliaksei Protas are 2 men who cannot be moved out of the blue paint, and Alex Tuch will do the same work. Anthony Beauvillier and Ethen Frank supply the quickness on the second unit. There is no gap in the personnel here — and the quiet story is that the 40-year-old is no longer the whole of it, which is both a loss and the reason this unit will survive him.

What the Quant Says

21st at 7.74 expected goals against per 60, and Washington was shorthanded 5:16 a game, fourth-most in the league. Below-median rate on heavy volume is the most expensive combination available, and it is the one genuine structural fault here.

The penalty minutes are the cost of how this team is built: Wilson 117, Chychrun 62, Leonard 47, Strome 46. A heavy club that takes penalties needs a kill that can absorb them, and this one cannot — which is another way of saying Thompson was cleaning that up too.

What the Scout Says

Well manned and asked to do too much. Boone Jenner is exactly the kind of centre a kill is built around; Alex Tuch's size and reach make a lane expensive; Ethen Frank's raw pace is a genuine shorthanded threat; Justin Sourdif is not big and does not shrink from anything, which is the whole requirement for the fourth-line half of this job.

On the blue line, Vincent Desharnais takes the front of the net outright and Martin Fehérváry closes gaps properly, and after those 2 the club is asking Sandin and Liljegren to hold ground neither can hold. The larger problem is volume, and it is self-inflicted: this is a club whose identity is contact, and Wilson, Desharnais at 68 penalty minutes, Chychrun at 62, Tuch at 57, Strome at 46 and Jenner at 44 are a great many men playing a style that puts their team down a man. A heavy club needs a kill that can absorb the bill, and this one has been handing that bill to its goaltender.