If you told me at the start of the season that we would be sitting on March 19th in a playoff spot I probably would have laughed at you and said I am looking forward to a high draft pick, but somehow someway our pesky Washington Capitals were sellers at the deadline losing guys like Kuzy, Mantha, and Edmundson and this team couldn’t look better I thinking the biggest thing is giving our young guys more ice time and confidence that we trust them.
Now lets take you to Monday night in Calgary where the Capitals bested the Flames 5-2 in a convincing win. On this road trip the Caps have gone 3-2-0, winning 3 straight games and currently sit in the final Wild Card position in the Eastern Conference.
Dylan Strome started the scoring last night with setting his career high in goals as well. Strome was left alone at the top of the right circle where he ripped a wicked wristers to give the boys a 1-0 lead.
Then our fearless Captain makes his appearance known with a nifty deflection in front netting his 20th goal of the season and becomes the 5th player in NHL history to reach the 20 goal mark 19 times and only the 3rd to record 19 straight 20 goal seasons. Ovi is also the ONLY player in NHL history to record 19 consecutive 20 goal seasons from the start of his career NBD!
Shortly after he got his first Ovi joined hatty watch on the power player scoring from his office with a one timer he does with his eyes closed, 3-0 Caps. It also marks his 24th career game with multiple power play goals.
On the goal Ovi claimed a new goalie victim in Dustin Wolf being the 174th different goalie Ovi has scored on. He only trails Jagr (178) and Marleau (177) for most different goalies scored on.
Calgary finally gets on the board halfway through the 2nd on a Caps turnover and great transition offensive crashing from their forward to beat a very well screened Lindgren, 3-1 Caps.
The Caps answered the Flames goal with one of their own with a play by Milano to keep the puck in the zone where he just shoveled the puck from the blue line towards the net where Lapierre was waiting and smacked the puck out of the air and goes bardown on Wolf, 4-1 Caps.
Lappy’s 8 points since Feb. 26th ranks 3rd among NHL rookies only trailing Bedard and Dalla’s Stankoven.
Into the 3rd period we go where Calgary shorten the Caps lead off a nice faceoff win to their defenseman who moved the puck to the middle of the circles and ripped a rockstar slapshot past Lindgren to make it 4-2 Caps.
Tom Wilson finished the scoring on the night with an empty netter and his 17th goal of the season to give the boys the 5-2 win.
Stop me if you’ve heard this before but Charlie Lindgren was a brick wall tonight. He is THE GUY right now the only time Kuemper should see the net is if Lindy needs a rest day.
Overall, nice win and wins we can not take for granted and the boys need to just play one game at a time and not think of what other teams are doing and focus on the job in front of them.
Unfortunately for the Caps there is not walk in the park when it comes to remaining games on the season. Their schedule is a beefy one with the next 6 coming against the Leafs, Canes, Jets, Wings, Leafs, Bruins, and the last game of the year being against Philly. All of these teams are still in playoff contention. Buckle up it should be a wild end of the season!
The Morning Skate 