Fifteen of sixteen. With a dominant win on home ice in Game Four, Alex Ovechkin and the Washington Capitals are one win short of the Stanley Cup.
The Golden Knights were buzzing in the first period, but after a couple of rung posts, the Caps took over. TJ Oshie scored a lovely power-play goal, then Tom Wilson turned an offensive-zone faceoff into a score of his own, with Devante Smith-Pelly rounding out the period with some fancy footwork.
The second period’s lone goal belonged to John Carlson, who got a nifty slapshot to beat Fleury on the power play. James Neal roofed a wristshot in the third period to end Braden Holtby’s shutout bid. Reilly Smith caught a great pass from Marchessault to cut the Caps’ lead in half, but Kempny put in the dagger with a one-timer during 4-on-4 play. Things got chippy late, so Brett Connolly punished the Knights for their churlishness with a 5-on-3 goal.
Caps beat Knights 6-2! Caps lead the series 3-1!
Tonight we dance. Nothing is forbidden anymore.
- Like in Games One and Two, Vegas was active early, more than doubling the Caps up in possession through ten minutes. But after James Neal hit the post on a power play, the Caps seemed to wake up.
James Neal had a yawning net on the PP. Instead his shot hits the post and the puck bounces off Holtby and out. pic.twitter.com/lApQGvFuHr
— Ian Oland (@ianoland) June 5, 2018
- And while it was a whole lot of Vegas action early, the Caps did a good job keeping those chances to limited-quality areas, whereas Washington found a way to surge towards Fleury’s net with regularity.
- Speaking of: Marc-Andre Fleury saved 478 of 505 shots prior to this series, a great 94.7 save percentage. Before tonight he had saved 70 of 80, a bad 87.5 save percentage. And then, in Game Four, Fleury saved just 17 of 23 shots. That’s, well, that’s 73 percent, so that’s not great. Fleury’s Conn Smythe aspirations turned to dust in the last week. The Caps did that.
- Meanwhile, at the other end of the ice, the real MVP of Game Four:
- It’s like the Caps were finally being paid back for the last decade of bad bounces. Every goofy-ass occurrence that got the Caps swept by Tampa or frustrated by Montreal or trounced by Pittsburgh, well, they were here in DC on Monday, but they all fell, finally, in the Washington’s favor. That’s new.
- Evgeny Kuznetsov recorded four assists, three primary. A few days ago we thought he might not play again this season. Haha, we know nothing. 🍎🍏🍎🍏
- TJ Oshie rode the Metro to the game. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move. He made up for it with a great net-crash to turn Kuznetsov’s rebound into a goal to open up scoring.
- Devante Smith-Pelly is gonna be well compensated for his postseason performance. In this one, DSP stopped a puck at the blue line to keep the attack going, which he then finished with a skate-to-stick move for the game’s third goal.
- Tom Wilson cross-checked Nate Schmidt. Friends, I got nothing here. Any other time of year, I’d be in knots over this. Tonight I’ve got other stuff on my mind. In his defense, Wilson’s sequence with Kuzy and Ovi for the second goal was proof positive that the top-line chemistry is cooking.
- The Caps recorded three power play goals, one during 5-on-3. It was their first game with more than one power-play goals since Game One of the Tampa series. Brett Connolly didn’t quite have the finesse of TJ Oshie in the slot, but he, um, he did fine in the end.
https://twitter.com/DiorNFLPA/status/1003803720482557952
Some of my very best friends of the night
There was a moment this winter when I was pretty much over it. The team wasn’t playing well, and I wasn’t writing well, and I was doing a bad job dealing with the bad feedback I got about my bad writing. I had run out of the ironic detachment that I had used in the past to excuse and contain the despair that comes with following with stupid, stupid team. My investment –- emotional but also untold spools of time and work — seemed a waste, without any merit or meaning. The team looked years away from doing anything worthwhile in the postseason, so all my effort felt like some obscene, narcissistic self-indulgence.
I don’t feel like that right now.
No, the Caps are one victory away from their first championship. Ovi’s first, Holtby’s first, Ted’s first, DC’s first, our first. Should they win one more, well, it’s not like all those hours and all that heartache we’ve invested –- some of us since 1974, some of us more recently –– will be suddenly vindicated. The Caps are on the verge of a championship, but we’re not on the verge of somehow magically getting paid back for all that anguish. This is just us feeling something new, different, and wonderful – and feeling it together.
We’re not quite there yet, so maybe this is a good time to think about what we’ve been through, and maybe more importantly, who we’ve been through it with. They are precious people and those were special times.
The Caps are one win away from the Stanley Cup, and we’re right there with ’em. This has been a good investment.
The fans outside are loving the late goal from Kempny #StanleyCup pic.twitter.com/jCvXWZ53Ui
— NBC Sports Hockey (@NBCSportsHockey) June 5, 2018
Crash the net.
Headline photo: Avi Gerver
