For the first time in their franchise history, the Washington Capitals have earned the most points among all NHL teams in the regular season.  After their loss to the Colorado Avalanches tonight, the San Jose Sharks cannot catch the Capitals’ 114 (and counting) points.  We’ve been all over this one (here and here).

Is the Prez the first of many trophies heading to D.C. this year?

What follows is a peek into a disturbed mind, wherein the machinations of p-values and standard deviations are comprehended with ease.  Abandon all hope, ye who read on, of understanding what Stevie K now lays at your feet; let the numbers wash over you and ease you into a narcotic stupor.  Trip the light fantastic amidst a really big spreadsheet.   I promise to bold the important stuff that makes sense to normal human beings.

I took the Standings page from ESPN and pasted it into a JMP data table, then manually input simulated results for every game. Simulated results required that the Caps win, and that for every other game, whichever team had more points going into the game would lose in regulation. The only exception is a game between Chicago and Phoenix on 3/23, where they have the same point total. Phoenix gets simulated to win this game because Chicago has more games remaining.

The columns at the end had JMP formulas in them.

• GAMES REMAINING is just 82 – today’s GP – games they’ve played so far in the simulation.
• POINTS UPDATED is PTS + all of the simulated game results so far
• Available Points is 2*GAMES REMAINING
• Can beat or tie Caps? is if (Available Points >= Caps(POINTS UPDATED)-OtherTeam's(POINTS UPDATED),1,0)

So each day of the remaining schedule I would make a new column, simulate the results, and update the 4 columns at the end. Once there were no more teams with a 1 in the last column, the Caps had won the Presidents’  Trophy. It occurs immediately at the end of the Ottawa game, where the Caps have 76GP and 114PTS. Chicago has 74GP and 97PTS.

Let’s go Caps.

Would you trust this man with your statistics?

You can view Stevie K’s inane spreadsheet here.

Okay, you can keep reading again.  Here’s what this means: if the Caps win every game, and all the other contenders lose every game, the soonest the Caps could win the Prez is after the March 30th game against the Senators (which we’ll be attending).  The god of statistics, MC Stephen Hawking, deems this unlikely.  Still, the projections favor the Caps to win first seed for the first time ever.

Let’s all take a moment to thank Stevie K. for giving us the most incomprehensible report since the last time he contributed to the blog.  (We kid because we love, K.  This is awesome.  Chipotle is on me next time!)

Obviously, the President loves him some sports. We do, too. The NCAA basketball tournament is one of the most exciting sports events of the year, and we could never disparage the President for being into it. We just want our Caps to get a little love, too. Speaking of, have you signed the Facebook petition yet?

Tonight, the Washington Capitals play the Hurricanes.  Ovechkin’s still suspended, Varly’s in net, and I’ll be able to watch the whole thing live for once.  Last time the ‘Canes and Caps met was only one week ago, and that game implausibly went to overtime before D.C. pulled out the win.  Hopefully, tonight will be a secure win in only 60 minutes.

With only 12 games to go the Washington Capitals are within striking distance of another franchise first: The Presidents’ Trophy.

Along with the cash bonuses to the organization it ensures home ice advantage throughout the playoffs – a huge plus to a team with a 26-4-4 record at the Phone Booth and PK issues away.

It is a five horse race (Washington, Chicago, Phoenix, Vancouver and San Jose) and the Caps have the easiest road to the prize.

The Caps play their remaining games against teams with an average .464 Win %. The other four contenders all play teams that average .507 or above:

• WSH .464
• CHI  .507
• SJS .520
• VAN .528
• PHX .538

Looking at the Simple Rating System (SRS) of each team’s remaining schedule once again shows the Caps have the easy road:

• PHX .20 SRS for remaining opponents
• VAN .16
• SJS .13
• CHI  .02
• WSH -.21

An average team will have a rating of zero. An above average team will have a positive rating while a below average team will have a negative rating. Every team will have a rating that is the equal to their average point margin plus the average of their opponent’s ratings, so the teams’ ratings are all interdependent: the Caps’ rating depends upon the ratings of all their opponents, which depends upon the ratings of all their opponents (some of which are the Caps), and so on.

And finally, if we look at the Goals For and against for the remaining teams, the Caps play teams that give up an average of 2.94 Goals per game while only scoring 2.77, giving them the best Pythagorean Win % of the finalists at .527. Next best is Chicago with an expected win % of .505 with the rest sub-.500.

So to sum up: The Washington Caps should lead all NHL teams with 119 points and have all roads for the Cup run through DC.