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Holtby heroics: Caps beat Sabres 2-1

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If it seems like just yesterday that the Washington Capitals and Buffalo Sabres matched up at Capital One Arena, for one your sense of time is horrible, that was six days ago and for two I mean you’re kinda right. On Friday evening, the Caps took those pesky, young Buffalonians down just like they did yester…err six days ago.

We were scoreless after twenty minutes of back and forth action and we only had one scoar after forty minutes. That scoar came from Chandler Stephenson on a shorthanded breakaway. Johan Larsson tied things up midway through the third. Tom Wilson gave the Caps a late lead.

Caps beat Sabres 2-1!

  • First period was scoreless, but I thought it had all the signs of a good hockey game to come. Sabres probably had the edge in terms of more golden scoring opportunities.
  • Early standouts in the game for me were Evgeny Kuznetsov and Jonas Siegenthaler. Kuzy had his rocket skates on and Jonas continues to impress me with his calm presence on the blue line at such a young age.
  • Here’s your reminder that the World Junior Classic starts on December 26 and you’re going to be able to get a good look at a few Capitals youngsters, led by 2018 first round pick Alexander Alexeyev on the Russian backend. He’ll be joined by Tobias Geisser on the Swiss team and Martin Fehervary on the Slovak team. There’s probably one or two more, I’m just blanking on them at the moment.

  • Cara found a juul at tonight’s game after she expressed her concern about the amount of “buffalo people” at Capital One Arena in our Slack channel. First things first, some poor bro is gonna miss out on so many fat clouds y’all. Second things second, we’re gonna need to talk to someone about letting half-bovines into the arena.
  • Braden Holtby is totally effective while at the same time beautiful! His Manuel Neuer blue line sweeper keeper routine might need some fine tuning though.
  • Second period was kinda all Sabres, all the time. Holts kept the good guys in the game after quite a few grade A chances for the Sabres top guys. However, a shorthanded goal from Chandler Stephenson had the boys up 1-0 through forty minutes.
  • Caps power play is still very powerless and Todd Reirden thinks them not having really any time to practice with the man advantage could be the culprit. Whatever it is, please fix it.
  • Ice was pretty garbage tonight which is kinda unfortunately a common occurrence at Capital One Arena in my incredibly professional opinion. Weirdly warm and humid December day in the DMV probably did not help.

  • Kuzy totally scored a goal in this game until the refs said he didn’t. But, he totally did, believe us. It was in the net as Dave Johnson would say.
  • There’s a new angle of Willy’s knockout blow delivered to Jamie Oleksiak and man does it ever show the full force of that punch. Ouch.
  • Big goal from Tom Wilson who seemingly is going to score 500 goals this season. Great primary assist from Kuzy who stripped goaltender Carter Hutton to give Wilson a look at an empty cage. Fantastic night from number 92.
  • Third period wasn’t great either from the Caps, but Holts was phenomenal again. Little bit of an injury scare for number 70, but he and the Caps both survived to take the two points.
  • Do want to say that I thought Andre Burakovsky was good in his return to the lineup. He looked fast, engaged, and was hard on the puck. Good start.

Caps are right back with you tomorrow night in Canada’s capital city, Ottawa. Capital City vs capital city matchup which means it’s probably good enough for NBC to call it a rivalry night. I am also right back with you tomorrow with another recap and more unfunny jokes.

Full RMNB Coverage of Caps vs Sabres

Headline photo: Patrick McDermott

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