There are plenty of reasons the Washington Capitals are fairly extreme longshots to make the playoffs this year, starting with their absolutely horrific power play (30th in the League in net efficiency, 22nd in five-on-four expected goal rate, etc.). A related contributor to their downfall, however, has been how few goals they’ve gotten in recent weeks from players they depend on to do exactly that. Consider:
- Alex Ovechkin (heard of him?) has scored in just one of the 14 games since January 27, a two-goal effort in a 6-2 loss at Montreal at the end of February.