The Washington Capitals brought an optimally organized and well rested lineup to Sunday’s matinee against a lottery-bound Detroit Red Wings, so you can understand my confusion as to why they played so very poorly for two-thirds of the game.
Alex Ovechkin scored on an Ovi shot from the Ovi spot during a first period power play, but Justin Abdelkader exploited a turnover and Matt Niskanen’s misplay to tie it up. The Caps had basically zero offense in the second period, which the Wings made them pay for with three goals in the final four minutes. It was a dunk fest, friends.
Brett Connolly finished a great drive from Smith-Pelly and Beagle to give the Caps life early in the third. Dmitry Orlov compounded the comeback with a weak-side one-timer. With 16 seconds left in the third and the Caps on the power play, Nick Backstrom tied the game with an outside shot.
The Caps had the better looks in overtime, but the Tatar had the last look.
Red Wings beat Caps 5-4 in overtime.
— Peter Hassett (@peterhassett) February 11, 2018
- Excellent setup by John Carlson to give Alex Ovechkin his 33rd goal of the season, tying last season’s total with almost 30 games left. Can Ovi hit 50? He’ll need to pick up the pace just a little bit.
- The Red Wings out-attempted the Caps 24 to 5 in the second period with scoring chances at 16 to 1. At that level, it would be charitable to consider this professional hockey. The three-goal surge for the Detroit was punishment for miserable play in their own end. I’m not sure I saw Jimmy Howard’s net for more than 30 seconds of that period. I wanna note that the Caps were trailing at this point, so it’s not like they were turtling with the lead. They just couldn’t get out of their zone.
- The Caps made up for the second with a thrilling comeback effort while down in the third, but I don’t know if it excuses the miserable effort before hand.
- I think this is called synecdoche: I love Braden Holtby’s hustle to save this shot in the first period, but this doesn’t happen unless a prior mistake was made.
🚫 #Holtbeast #CapsWings pic.twitter.com/scFIabQCu1
— Washington Capitals (@Capitals) February 11, 2018
- Like, even though the Caps got a somewhat happy ending, that was a dreary performance. Specifically…
- Andre Burakovsky returned to active play… and stunk up the joint – though he was not unique in that respect. After I wrote a whole defensive thing about him this morning, I feel personally betrayed. Nice looks in OT though.
- I wanna call out Devante Smith-Pelly got crushed on balance, but he drew the penalty that created the Ovi goal and generated a bunch of chances, including the primary assist on the Orlov goal. I love his spark.
I SCORE? I SCORE! pic.twitter.com/3SG0afpmsi
— Ian Oland (@ianoland) February 11, 2018
- Amazing. Ian found iron-clad evidence that Nick Backstrom can smile. Proof positive, I think.
- Putting Evgeny Kuznetsov out for the opening faceoff of overtime makes me wanna eat a Tide pod.
#JoeBSuitOfTheNight except more like late brunch time
a rare game in which Locker has outdressed Joe B — purple is superb pic.twitter.com/ey0eVlpHZ1— Peter Hassett (@peterhassett) February 11, 2018
¯_(ツ)_/¯ Can’t even.
Full RMNB Coverage of Caps vs Red Wings
Headline photo: Patrick McDermott
