203 – Number of penalties taken by the Capitals through 49 games this season, which leads the League. 184 of those 203 penalties have been minors, which also leads the League and got a significant bump with last night’s whopping six penalties in the loss to San Jose (on which they ceded two power-play goals).
Not surprisingly, the team leader in overall penalty minutes is Tom Wilson with 58; however, he’s racked up a significant chunk of those PIMs via four major penalties (and a few misconducts). Michal Kempny holds the team lead in minors with 20, with Evgeny Kuznetsov right behind with 19 – both of which are among the top 15 in the League.
For a team currently mired in a six-game losing streak and looking to cut back on mistakes, the overabundance of penalties taken seems like a good place to start… especially with the penalty kill lingering in the bottom third of the League for most of the season.