{"id":261778,"date":"2025-10-31T00:17:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-31T00:17:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/261778\/"},"modified":"2025-10-31T00:17:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-31T00:17:08","slug":"spencer-carbery-analyzes-capitals-early-offensive-struggles-were-not-finishing-at-a-high-rate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/261778\/","title":{"rendered":"Spencer Carbery analyzes Capitals\u2019 early offensive struggles: \u2018We\u2019re not finishing at a high rate\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

ARLINGTON, VA \u2014 After a high-scoring 2024-25 season, the Capitals have been relatively quiet on the scoreboard this fall. The Capitals rank 26th in the league in average goals per game after scoring just 27 times in their first 10 contests, 17 goals fewer than they\u2019d had at the same point last season.<\/p>\n

Head coach Spencer Carbery told reporters on Thursday that he\u2019d done a dive into the Caps\u2019 offensive analytics as he looked for ways to increase total scoring. He argued that the team\u2019s larger processes were successful in setting up valuable opportunities; instead, the trouble came from players\u2019 inability to convert.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, it\u2019s something that we\u2019ve talked a lot about,\u201d Carbery said. \u201cThe underlying numbers are there. The film\u2019s there. We\u2019re doing a lot of good things. I think there\u2019s some things that we could do a little bit better job of while we work ourselves through a little bit of guys not finishing at a high rate. I think that\u2019s probably the biggest difference right now.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not finishing at a high rate, so what does that mean? That means when we get in on a two-on-one or a breakaway right now, last year those were going in the net a lot for a lot of different guys. For the first ten games (this season), it hasn\u2019t gone in a lot for a lot of guys. Okay, no problem. You can still win games and still score goals without finishing at a high rate\u201d<\/p>\n

Carbery, who\u2019s spoken in the past<\/a> about benefitting from an analytic perspective, also looked into the team\u2019s middling success at getting time in the offensive zone, though his research into the numbers suggested that was less of an issue than he\u2019d first expected.<\/p>\n

\u201cZone time is something we\u2019re not very \u2014 I don\u2019t want to say strong \u2014 but it\u2019s not a strong suit of our group,\u201d he said. \u201cBecause we have a couple lines that it\u2019s more difficult for them to move around and skate and cut back and hold on to pucks. We, in my time here, and I\u2019ve dove into it a lot, because you want to spend as much time in the offensive zone as you can. And we\u2019re generally around the middle of the pack in that stat. It\u2019s always caught me off guard.<\/p>\n

\u201cLast year especially, we\u2019re one of the top offensive expected goal teams in the league, but our O-zone time is middle of the pack. Why is that? So then when you dive into it, it\u2019s just a little bit more challenging for us to move around. It\u2019s just not how we\u2019re built a little bit. It is something that I pay attention to, but I don\u2019t get overly concerned with us being in the top five or top three zone time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some of the scoring decrease from 2024-25 was to be expected: that Capitals group had an impressive 14.4 shooting percentage through 10 games, ending the year first in the NHL with 12.2%. This season, they rank 27th in the NHL with just 9.3% of shots hitting paydirt.<\/p>\n

The team\u2019s analytics support Carbery\u2019s assertion that players are managing to generate chances, even if they aren\u2019t making it to the back of the net. Per Natural Stat Trick, Washington is averaging a league-leading 3.84 expected goals per game, more than a full goal per game above its actual scoring.<\/p>\n

Other extenuating factors have also played a role. Washington\u2019s special teams have struggled mightily to begin the year, ranking 20th in power play percentage (18.8%) and 27th in penalty kill percentage (67.9%). The Caps\u2019 top two centers, Dylan Strome and Pierre-Luc Dubois, have both already lost time to injury. And Alex Ovechkin, like many of his teammates, has had a slow start with just two goals so far.<\/p>\n

Though last year\u2019s Capitals racked up goals at a rapid-fire pace, Carbery got experience dealing with a low-scoring team in his debut season in DC<\/a>, where the Caps ranked fourth-worst in the NHL with an average of just 2.63 per night. Carbery made light of that early dry spell on Thursday when questioned about the team\u2019s scoring woes compared to 2024-25.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, I\u2019d ask you, what year are you referring to? My first year here or my second year?\u201d he asked, grinning. When reassured the question wasn\u2019t about the 2023-24 campaign, he quipped, \u201cHappy thoughts. Happy thoughts.\u201d<\/p>\n

The current Capitals\u2019 team, unlike the 2023-24 squad, has largely been able to compensate for low scoring with strong defense, limiting opponents to a league-leading average of 2.20 goals per game. But while defense has remained steady and the underlying numbers suggest offense could be on the way, Carbery still believes the group has some things to work on to regain the ability to convert on chances they showed last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re missing a little bit of how we were able to score a little bit more often last year, and we\u2019ve looked at it as a staff,\u201d Carbery said. \u201cWe\u2019re dialing in. We\u2019re working on it and addressing it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ARLINGTON, VA \u2014 After a high-scoring 2024-25 season, the Capitals have been relatively quiet on the scoreboard this…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":235882,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-261778","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261778","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=261778"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261778\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/235882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=261778"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=261778"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=261778"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}