Hockey
Will the Ovechkin Club take the Stanley Cup again? Washington’s perfect off-season performance
“Capital” solved the issue with the goalkeepers and the depth of the composition.
This off-season, several clubs surprised the fans with loud transitions. So, Columbus made a noise with the signing of Johny Gaudreau, and Florida and Calgary organized one of the most interesting exchanges over the past few years – Jonathan Huberdo moves to the locker room to the “lights”, and Matthew Tkachak became a teammate of Sergei Bobrovsky.
Against this background, Washington stands out, which did not make high-profile transfers, but managed to close the necessary positions and strengthen before the start of the new season. Observers of The Athletic highly appreciated the work done by the management of the capital club and included the Caps among the teams that acted best in the market.
Now Alexander Ovechkin has a real chance to win the second cup.
Resolved issue with goalkeepers
Fans of “Washington” first of all expected that the club’s management would solve the problems with the goalkeeper line. Tandem Ilya Samsonov – Vitek Vanechek did not live up to expectations. And after the season, the club directly said that they no longer rely on young goalkeepers and will look for a replacement for them. The Caps released Samsonov to Toronto and Vanechek to New Jersey. So, the club was left without a main goalkeeper at once, having only avenues in the roster.
But since the leadership has already indicated that Washington will now rely on experienced goalkeepers, the fans of the Capitals began to wait for the next step from the club’s manager Brian McLellan. And he managed to surprise not only the Caps fans, but the entire league – Ovechkin’s teammate was Darcy Kemper, who recently won the Stanley Cup.
About Kemper, many experts said that he is one of the weakest goalkeepers who managed to win the major league trophy. However, his statistics are all right – at the end of last season, Kemper ranked fourth in the league in the number of wins (37), was fifth in the percentage of shots saved (0.921) and 11th in the number of goals conceded (with an average of 2.54 ) in 57 games. The ex-goalkeepers of the “capital” statistics are much worse.
Vanechek played 42 games, conceding an average of 2.67 goals per game, and has a 0.908 save percentage. The Russians have even more modest figures – 3.02 and 0.896%, respectively. But for the fans of “Washington” it is more important that Kemper was never changed during the game, but the Czech keeper three times, Samsonov – five.
The new goaltender signed a five-year, $5.25 million contract with the Caps. The Capitals hope that the 32-year-old Kemper will continue to show a stable level and completely close the club’s problematic position.
Washington did not stop there and signed a good and experienced replacement – Charlie Lindgren. Kiper spent most of his career in the AHL, where he was one of the best and showed excellent statistics. Last season, he also played five games in the NHL – in all of these meetings, his “St. Louis” won.
“Washington” has created an excellent goalkeeper tandem, which is able to reach the final. But the Caps management also had to solve the problem with the depth of the squad – this is one of the main diseases of the club last season. The “capital” had segments when the team could not win without Ovi’s goals.
Serious Cup Chance
To fix this problem, Washington could sign another ex-Colorado player Nazem Kadri. The star center forward is still a free agent and cannot find a new club. The fans expected from McLellan that he would start negotiations with the striker, who would clearly strengthen the team. But, as in the case of goalkeepers, the manager outlined the policy of the club even before the opening of the market.
“We can’t go and sign a player for $9 million,” McLellan said.
And according to experts, Kadri is counting on a contract with a salary of more than $8 million. Therefore, McLellan opted for inexpensive players for the depth of the composition – Connor Brown from Ottawa and Dylan Strom from Chicago. Last season, Strom played in 69 games for the Blackhawks, scoring 22 goals and 26 assists – a great statistic for a third lineman. In addition, Strom is a rather large player – 190 cm and 90 kg, which should add muscle and aggression to the team.
Brown, on the other hand, is considered a defensive forward who is good at catching the puck and fighting in the corners. However, the striker does well not only in his own half – last season he played 64 matches for Ottawa, in which he scored 10 goals and gave 29 assists.
In addition to these key signings, Washington did a great job in the recent draft – under the 20th number, the Caps selected Ivan Miroshnichenko. Next season, the Russian is unlikely to play for the Capitals, but the club expects that in a couple of years the striker will become one of the best in the team.
As a result, on paper, Washington has become one of the most balanced teams in the league. The Capitals, after winning the Stanley Cup Finals in 2018, have not made it past the first round of the playoffs for four seasons in a row. This off-season, Ovechkin’s club took a serious step to stay in the relegation games as long as possible and even win the second cup in the club’s history.
Source: Sportbox
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