Washington Capitals Thumbs Up Thumbs Down (CMigrator copy 9)

Winnipeg Jets 3-2 (SO) Washington Capitals

Washington Capitals 2-3 New York Rangers

San Jose Sharks 5-3 Washington Capitals

Thumbs Up:

Alexander Semin: With the trade deadline around the corner, Alex Semin is really turning it on for the Caps. He had another great week, scoring two goals and adding an assist while maintaining an even plusminus. The week's effort gives Sasha 10 goals and 13 assists for 23 points in his last 25 games, numbers that over a full season would give a player 75 points. Semin has been the Caps best player as of late, and is beginning to turn heads again as an elite NHL scorer.

Roman Hamrlik: Hamrlik was signed this summer with the expectation of becoming one of the team's better defenseman both defensively and offensively. It did not turn out well to start, as Hamrlik scored just one goal and was a -10 in his 22 games under Bruce Boudreau. In his 30 games since then, however, Hamrlik has one goal, eight assists, and is a +11. This week, he had one goal and two assists along with a +1. The Czech defenseman is steadily improving, and is starting to pay dividends for the Caps.

Thumbs Down:

The Penalty Kill: Eleven powerplays given up, five goals against. An ugly 54.5% success rate. That sums up the penalty kill this week for the Caps. At 80.1% of penalties killed, the unit has been nowhere near good enough this season anyway (25th in the NHL), so when it has a bad week, it hurts. Consider that half of the 10 goals the Caps gave up this week were on penalties, and you see that had the unit been better, the Caps could have won three games. It was awful, and that is without mentioning the shorthanded goal the powerplay gave up...

Goaltending: The Caps used three different goaltenders this week. Two of them gave up goals from behind the blueline. None of them were able to win. A combined goals against average of around 3.33 and a save percentage of .884% spells a miserable week in Caps land.