Rangers Visit Caps In Monday NHL Action

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This time last season, the Washington Capitals were compiling the best records in the NHL by simply outscoring their opponents. All they had to show for their Alex Ovechkin led offensive assault, however, was another early playoff exit. Things have been a little different this season—due to injuries to key playmakers and a renewed emphasis on defense their scoring is down significantly. They'll host the surprising New York Rangers at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC on Monday night in a preview of a potential Stanley Cup playoff series.

Last year the Capitals finished with a league best 121 points and scored the most goals in the NHL with 318. That's a far cry from the league's all time single season team goal scoring record—Wayne Gretzky's Edmonton Oilers scored an absurd 446 goals in 1983-84—but that 46 more than the league's #2 goal scoring team (Vancouver) and 47 more than the third high scoring team (Chicago). These offensive superlatives were of little consolation to the Caps as they fell well short of the Stanley Cup finals.

The transformation of the team from this year to last has been almost bizarre. Last season the Caps finished with a 3.87 goals per game average. Through 47 games this year they're averaging 2.82 goals per game—1.05 fewer. They're also allowing fewer goals this season, though the improvement has been fractional—the Caps finished last season with a 2.84 goals against average and to this point of the season they've allowed 2.63 goals per game. Their W/L record isn't as glossy this season—no surprise there—and they've become the best UNDER bet in the NHL. Through January 19, Washington has gone UNDER in 32 of 47 games, with only 13 OVER and 2 pushes. In other words, the Caps have gone UNDER or pushed in 72.3% of their games this year.

New York is a tough matchup for Washington since they've become very adept at the 'gritty' play that the Caps are trying to master. The Rangers are capable of exploding for a lot of goals against substandard opposition-like last Wednesday when they ripped Toronto 7-0—but they’re also a strong UNDER play. New York has gone UNDER in 28 of 48 games this year with 17 OVER and 3 push. As of January 19, the Rangers have the #4 scoring defense in the NHL and shockingly are ranked higher in scoring offense than the Caps—New York is #13, Washington #15.

The Capitals are still a decent home team—as of this writing they're 16-5-5 at the Verizon Center. Still, it's important to keep in mind that they only lost 5 games in regulation and 6 in OT at home all last season. The Rangers should be a decent sized underdog in this matchup and they're definitely the value play (15-8-1 away from home through 1/19/11) in what should be yet another UNDER for the sputtering Washington offense.