Possibly The Best Capitals Team

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Along with the Kansas City Scouts, the Capitals joined the NHL as an expansion team for the 1974–75 season. The team was owned by Abe Pollin (also owner of the National Basketball Association’s Washington Bullets/Wizards until his death on November 24, 2009).

Pollin had built the Capital Centre in suburban Landover, Maryland, to house both the Bullets (who formerly played in Baltimore) and the Capitals. His first act as owner was to hire Hall of Famer Milt Schmidt as general manager.

First, the team hired David Poile as general manager. Second, as his first move, Poile pulled off one of the largest trades in franchise history on September 9, 1982, when he dealt longtime regulars Ryan Walter and Rick Green to the Montreal Canadiens in exchange for Rod Langway (named captain only a few weeks later), Brian Engblom, Doug Jarvis and Craig Laughlin. This move turned the franchise around, as Langway’s solid defense helped the team to dramatically reduce its goals-against, and the explosive goal-scoring of Dennis Maruk, Mike Gartner and Bobby Carpenter fueled the offensive attack. Another significant move was the drafting of defenseman Scott Stevens during the 1982 NHL Entry Draft (the pick was made by Interim GM Roger Crozier, prior to Poile’s hiring). The result was a 29-point jump, a third-place finish in the powerful Patrick Division, and the team’s first playoff appearance in 1983. Although they were eliminated by the three-time-defending (and eventual) Stanley Cup champion New York Islanders (three games to one), the Caps’ dramatic turnaround ended any talk of the club leaving Washington.

The Capitals’ current record puts them on a pace for 129 points this season. The team with the second best points percentage in the league (Dallas) is “only” on pace for 111 points. That 18-point gap, if both teams maintain their current pace, would be the largest since the 1995-96 Detroit Red Wings finished 27 points ahead of the Colorado Avalanche. Only three teams since then have finished with more than a 10-point gap over the second best team in the league (two of them reached the Stanley Cup of the Final).

They are the first team in NHL history to ever win 40 of their first 53 games. When looking at that stat it is important to keep in mind they have the advantage of the shootout that every team prior to 2005-06 did not have. Those games would have simply ended as tie games before. If you remove the Capitals’ three shootout wins from and simply treat them as ties, that would still give them 37 wins on the season. Only 12 teams before the introduction of the shootout ever won 37 out of their first 53 games.

When they lost to Pittsburgh in the second round of the 2009 playoffs, and then won the Presidents’ Trophy the next season, they were trying to win a Stanley Cup with guys like Brendan Morrison, Boyd Gordon, Dave Steckel and the last legs of Sergei Fedorov’s Hall of Fame career as their top centers behind Backstrom. They never had a true second-line center who could drive a scoring line, something that is pretty important when it comes to being a championship NHL team.

This team’s second-line center is a top-five scorer in the entire league.

Where this ends up taking them this season obviously remains to be seen, but they are clearly the best team in the NHL at the moment and has as good of a chance as anybody else to win it all. And probably a better chance than any Capitals team that came before it.

http://www.cbssports.com/nhl/eye-on-hockey/25481797/this-is-the-best-capitals-team-ever-and-they-are-dominating-the-nhl