Post-Game Talk: Ghost of Ryan Miller’s chest vs Carl hagelins shot

[maacoshark]

If you watch the daily presser, Laviolette will often comment that they worked on the power play in a given practice. Its fairly consistent. He says the same about the penalty kill. The media coverage has talked about the pp problem, but when it comes down to it, they have a staffing problem on that pp that can't be fixed with a rotation of back up players. Penalty kills just guard Ovechkin and Carlson and will do that regardless of where you put them

With Backstrom out of the lineup our pp just isn't in sync. They need to completely revamp the pp. Right now the pp is mostly Kuzy, Carlson and Ovie.
Sheary stands behind the goal line and Oshie stands in the slot. Neither are being utilized. If you aren't going to use all 5 players on the ice that it really isn't a pp.

 

[tenken00]

Before this season started, we had no idea what we were going to get with Sammy this year. Especially after the ending to last year.

Consider that 2nd rounder for VV as the cost of insurance. Or at least the cost for peace of mind.

 

[maacoshark]

Before this season started, we had no idea what we were going to get with Sammy this year. Especially after the ending to last year.

Consider that 2nd rounder for VV as the cost of insurance. Or at least the cost for peace of mind.

There is no piece of mind with Vanecek.

 

[g00n]

Agree that VV has some obvious flaws, but overreact much? He gave up 2 goals last night and had a .938 sav%.

If he's not coming out far enough this far along that's on the coaches. But more concerning to me is how small he appears in the net and how slow he's been to react to the high shot. If you're giving that space and you don't have a quick glove or blocker you're asking for it.

That said, I'm sure I'm not the only one who watches Sammy on a good day and is reminded of Kolzig.

 

[VaCaps Fan]

Vanny has hit his ceiling.

 

[IafrateOvie34]

Agree that VV has some obvious flaws, but overreact much? He gave up 2 goals last night and had a .938 sav%.

If he's not coming out far enough this far along that's on the coaches. But more concerning to me is how small he appears in the net and how slow he's been to react to the high shot. If you're giving that space and you don't have a quick glove or blocker you're asking for it.

That said, I'm sure I'm not the only one who watches Sammy on a good day and is reminded of Kolzig.

I tried to support VV because he is a Cap and drafted by the Caps, however he isn't an NHL starter. I remember years ago when Mike Keenan said, "Curtis Jospeh isn't a Stanley Cup type winner". This imho applies to VV. He may start for bottom feeder teams, but he hasn't shown anything special that he is a true NHL starter like Sammie's potential. I rather Sammie get the full loadout and work through his growing pains. VV could end up like Joseph and have incredible regular season games, but he does not show me anything close to a guy who can win it all. Keep him as a backup or send him out in a package to a rebuilding team who is selling veterans or RFAs.

 

[IafrateOvie34]

Gratz.

7 straight loses. Really don't want to go for 17 or whatever again.

You won't. Hang in there. Buffalo will have a great team in a few years and improving. It's been a hectic ride so far for you Buffalo fans, but you'll get there.

 

[IafrateOvie34]

Starting to notice a serious lack of discipline from the team. Players are constantly overstaying their shifts, low percentage passing plays, a barrage of odd man opportunities against.

I think the work load is starting to get to Jensen-Orlov pairing a little bit. Kuznetsov and Ovechkin, too. On some of the odd man rushes against, the guys are so exhausted that they don't even try to back check. That said, it's December and injury/Covid situation is very serious.

Take the two points and run. Also, power play sucks and is an absolute momentum drain. Awful.

Don't forget more offside plays like in the past too .

 

[IafrateOvie34]

Said it when we traded to get him back...should have just let him go and kept the draft pick. Sammy is getting better with more starts and Fucale could have done the 20-25 game backup job. At that time I said Copley but either one really could have given us spot starts on b2b with at least average goaltending.

Do you think Ted might have had something to do with this move? I sort of do because he was drafted and had a decent first year. I totally agree with you.

 

[IafrateOvie34]

He looked even below average to me. Every time he drops into the butterfly, he leaves a lot of room for shooters to shoot the puck top corners. The better shooting teams take advantage of his flaw, but the Sabres didn't or messed up trying to. I thought they shot too many times low on Vitek. Caps were very lucky to get it to OT. They should have lost the shootout...

So do I regarding Fucale. It's a shame because Fucale numbers have dipped a lot with Hershey(went from a .930 SV% to now .898 SV%). I think the fact that Hershey had to send up so many players to the Caps because of injuries and COVID-19, the Bears haven't been able to field a good enough team and the fact that they had to cancel a bunch of games because of COVID-19.

To me Fucale has the better goalie fundamentals than Vanecek.

Indeed.

 

[IafrateOvie34]

Games like this where you miss Hathaway, dowd, Wilson. Not because of the scoring but the energy. They are the energizer bunnies we are missing

And cheap shots aren't easily given by opponents.

 

[txpd]

With Backstrom out of the lineup our pp just isn't in sync. They need to completely revamp the pp. Right now the pp is mostly Kuzy, Carlson and Ovie.
Sheary stands behind the goal line and Oshie stands in the slot. Neither are being utilized. If you aren't going to use all 5 players on the ice that it really isn't a pp.

Revamp how? The guy in the corner is there for 3 primary reasons. He is an outlet pass for the guy on the halfwall, He is there to pass to the bumper shooter. He is directly diagonal from Ovechkin to retrieve his misses. The bumper guy can take a one time shot pass from the half wall and the corner and his positioning is supposed to make the pk choose between opening up the cross ice to Ovechkin and guarding him. Whats going on now is that the pk's dont care about the guy with the puck on the halfwall. He is no threat.

If you want to revamp the power play, you are effectively stuck trying to find a way for your 2 least dangerous goal scorers to be your primary goal scorer enough to break the pk out of his current plan. Last season Backstrom was creating puck movement to open Oshie up to deflect off line shots well up in the slot. Without Oshie and Backstrom, that wasn't happening. I expect Oshie will get going when he gets settle. So, how would you make Kuzy and Sheary your successful go to guys?

 

[Calicaps]

Wow. I totally forgot there was even a game yesterday. Oof. Glad to see they pulled out a W, even if it was a gimmick win.

 

[CapitalsCupReality]

Agree that VV has some obvious flaws, but overreact much? He gave up 2 goals last night and had a .938 sav%.

If he's not coming out far enough this far along that's on the coaches. But more concerning to me is how small he appears in the net and how slow he's been to react to the high shot. If you're giving that space and you don't have a quick glove or blocker you're asking for it.

That said, I'm sure I'm not the only one who watches Sammy on a good day and is reminded of Kolzig.

Tough crowd when you’re getting pooped on for that….seems like a pretty ok night for a backup to me.

 

[traparatus]

Tough crowd when you’re getting pooped on for that….seems like a pretty ok night for a backup to me.

He did look pretty clueless on some of the chances against. It is what it is. I don't know how anyone could have watched that game and not feel that Vanecek got away with one.

So did the rest of the team.

 

[CapitalsCupReality]

He did look pretty clueless on some of the chances against. It is what it is. I don't know how anyone could have watched that game and not feel that Vanecek got away with one.

So did the rest of the team.

there’s a reason they don’t count posts as shots on goal, yet here, because the opponent was inaccurate last night, it’s an opportunity to bash our own…..it’s the same handful of posters so whatever, just seems overly critical to me.

as with any backup performance, I’m just happy to get the win.

 

[maacoshark]

Revamp how? The guy in the corner is there for 3 primary reasons. He is an outlet pass for the guy on the halfwall, He is there to pass to the bumper shooter. He is directly diagonal from Ovechkin to retrieve his misses. The bumper guy can take a one time shot pass from the half wall and the corner and his positioning is supposed to make the pk choose between opening up the cross ice to Ovechkin and guarding him. Whats going on now is that the pk's dont care about the guy with the puck on the halfwall. He is no threat.

If you want to revamp the power play, you are effectively stuck trying to find a way for your 2 least dangerous goal scorers to be your primary goal scorer enough to break the pk out of his current plan. Last season Backstrom was creating puck movement to open Oshie up to deflect off line shots well up in the slot. Without Oshie and Backstrom, that wasn't happening. I expect Oshie will get going when he gets settle. So, how would you make Kuzy and Sheary your successful go to guys?

You make it sound like we only have one possible set up for our pp. That just isn't the case. Others teams have different set ups.
I seem to remember a couple years ago when the pp was struggling we changed it up by putting 2 big bodies in front of the net. I think we should do it again.
There are other options. Another option might be quarterbacking the pp from the point rather than the half. Might be tough to do that with our personnel because our shooters are all right handed shots.

 

[maacoshark]

there’s a reason they don’t count posts as shots on goal, yet here, because the opponent was inaccurate last night, it’s an opportunity to bash our own…..it’s the same handful of posters so whatever, just seems overly critical to me.

as with any backup performance, I’m just happy to get the win.

A post isn't a shot on goal but it certainly gives us an idea on Vanacek positioning we he is beat so many times only to be saved by the post or a near miss. Vanacek was beaten cleanly several times in this game. He was very fortunate to not give up 3 or 4 more goals.
And for the record all shots that are counted as shots on goal are necessarily an actual shot on net. Many times you will see a goalie make a save on a shot that is going wide counted as a shot on goal. You can also bet that if all of those shots that rang off the bar hit the goalie they would have been counted as shots on goal.

 

[CapitalsCupReality]

“Beaten cleanly”…….fine they can hit as many posts as they want, they’re not in and that’s all that matters.

 

[traparatus]

there’s a reason they don’t count posts as shots on goal, yet here, because the opponent was inaccurate last night, it’s an opportunity to bash our own…..it’s the same handful of posters so whatever, just seems overly critical to me.

as with any backup performance, I’m just happy to get the win.

We can't all be the very bestest, most amazing fan. Not with you occupying the spot.

 

[CapitalsCupReality]

We can't all be the very bestest, most amazing fan. Not with you occupying the spot.

it’s ok little buddy, you can disagree without trying to turn it into your schticky routine.

 

[txpd]

You make it sound like we only have one possible set up for our pp. That just isn't the case. Others teams have different set ups.
I seem to remember a couple years ago when the pp was struggling we changed it up by putting 2 big bodies in front of the net. I think we should do it again.
There are other options. Another option might be quarterbacking the pp from the point rather than the half. Might be tough to do that with our personnel because our shooters are all right handed shots.

No. I am not saying that there is one set up. I am saying the the opposition isnt going to let Ovechkin or Carlson shoot the puck. You have to deal with that problem first because who is shooting the puck into those two big bodies? Do you want to put Ovechkin in front of the goalies and shoot pucks at him? My point is that wherever you put Ov he is going to covered and so will Carlson. It still comes back to the guy with the puck being challenged to do something with it.

Sure. You could qb the pp from Carlson and put Orlov on the halfwall to shoot. I like that idea, but that means that your best puck handlers, Backstrom and then Kuzy, dont touch the puck. They are playing with this on pp2 right now. The trouble is that puck control and movement becomes the problem and they dont keep possession after setting up. Orlov is out there but I think Ive seen him go 1 chance to shoot it.

One of their recent changes has been to rotate Ovechkin and Carlson left. Ov ends up near the goal post and Carlson in Ov's office. Problem is they are still covered by the same two guys and Kuzy is now too far away from the net to be any threat at all. As with before the pk just challenges Kuzy to beat them. Its almost like the best option is to take 8 off the pp and play a 5 man balanced thing. But that is surrendering to the tactics against.

 

[txpd]

“Beaten cleanly”…….fine they can hit as many posts as they want, they’re not in and that’s all that matters.

Whats a clean beat post? When the net is empty and you hit the post. Yup. When you shoot the puck over the goalie's should a couple of inches and hit the post or crossbar, logic says that a shot on the net hits the shoulder.

 

[CapitalsCupReality]

Whats a clean beat post? When the net is empty and you hit the post. Yup. When you shoot the puck over the goalie's should a couple of inches and hit the post or crossbar, logic says that a shot on the net hits the shoulder.

nope not around here….opponent hitting a post means your goalie sucks in these parts.

 

[trick9]

I don't get the hate on Vanecek. I'm propably not as high as most on him but an average backup? IMO he's a great 1B goalie. I would gladly trade that 2nd round pick for him again anytime.