(Photo: James Carey Lauder-USA TODAY Sports)
The Caps impressive six game winning streak came to a halt on Saturday. The Caps were on their way to sweeping every team on their three-game road trip, until giving up an overtime goal to Winnipeg. After waiting a painful eight minutes for the refs and Toronto to review a potential offsides call, it was ultimately called a good goal. Game and streak over.
But was it off sides? According to Trotz he’s positive that it was offsides, and Scheifele’s late goal should have been waved off. It seems that many NHL fans have come to a consensus that the coach’s challenge, in its current configuration, is not working. Normally I’m against it. But in this case I believe Trotz made a good call.
With the caps sitting on top of the Metropolitan division, it may be hard to conceive that the team has flaws. Don’t get me wrong, this team is doing great. We are one of the strongest teams in the NHL right now. As a hardcore fan I’m tough on this team. How many times have we heard “This is the team” or “It’s our year”.
I’m not saying we don’t have the talent to get there. Because we do. We’re strong and after years of going back and forth with multiple goaltenders, it seems like we have found our guy. Holtby has proven himself as an Elite goaltender, and with the additions of Williams and Oshie, this team is solid. In addition, it looks like we now have defensive pairings that seem to be building more and more chemistry with each and every game. Finally, it seems we have the depth we’ve been lacking for so long. Maybe it IS indeed our year and maybe we do indeed have the right group of guys to raise the cup. But why aren’t we beating teams that would really give this caps team a confidence boost.
Sure we are winning games against teams who sit at the bottom of the standings. In my opinion, we need to beat teams like Dallas, who has proven themselves a Stanley cup contender just 27 games into the season. Sure we beat Montréal but did we deserve it? The Habs outshot us for most of the game. Don’t get me wrong, the Habs have an abundance of skill, but with Price out and Montreal’s backup in we should have beat them by more than one goal.
We’re losing to teams in our own division. How many times must we fall to the Rangers? Sure they have an elite goaltender which, let’s be honest, even with a complete breakdown of defense is still pretty good. It seems that the Rangers are in a slump, mostly due to injuries.
Don’t get me started on the loss we took to the Penguins. It is unexplainable, especially since they seem to have been in a rut since the start of the season, with Crosby not even on the leaderboard for points. Malkin is the only player keeping that team alive.
This caps team is good. Some would even consider them great. Is it possible for a team to win all 82 games in a season? Of course not. I would just rather see this Caps team show us what their really made of against teams that have the potential to be playoff bound.
By Caitlin Warren
