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Statement game: Caps beat Penguins 5-2

By Peter Hassett

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March 7, 2020 3:36 pm

The Washington Capitals did something they haven’t done in a while: win a game in entertaining, convincing fashion. And as a bonus, they did it against the Penguins.

It was a fun first period, with the Caps securing an early lead off Nic Dowd’s stick, then extending it with Nicklas Backstrom and Richard Panik. The second period came and went without a goal, but Nic Dowd scored a shorthanded goal early in the third.

Sidney Crosby snapped the shutout as Brenden Dillon turned the puck over in the defensive zone, then Evgeni Malkin made it 4-2 with a power-play, but TJ Oshie returned fire with a quick shot from the slot to restore the three-goal lead and win.

Caps win.

  • The fourth line were the heroes today, generating two goals at even strength plus a shorthanded goal from their center.  They set a tone the whole team followed: be aggressive and physical, and create high/low chances from the slot.
  • That shorty from Nic Dowd was his third of the season. It also gave him his first career multi-goal game. His whole line — in its newly Panik’d iteration — thoroughly menaced Matt Martin’s net all game.

  • Three of those goals came early as Washington seemed to be exorcising some of their demons in the first period.
  • Left out of the fun today was the top line, who couldn’t get anything going during five-on-five play. I’m not enjoying the Ovechkin-Kuznetsov force dyad much lately.

  • Another great game from Braden Holtby. He still had to stand up tall against a handful of odd-man rushes that came in the game’s back half.
  • One of those odd-man rushes came from Jared McCann. Holtby stopped him, but then McCann got a penalty shot. So Holtby had to do double duty.
  • We don’t get a ton of opportunities to sing Nick Jensen‘s praises, but he’s been pretty solid lately, and he had a sweet hip check in the third period.
  • One problem we can’t overlook: the Caps still have a discipline problem, going shorthanded five times, including a long two-man advantage in the first period. Despite every other positive thing today, the penalties do not describe a model for success.

There were a lot of questions about this team prior to today’s game. The viability of their current style and approach wasn’t really certain. And while this wasn’t a perfect game, it was certainly a statement: Don’t count out the Caps just yet.

Hooray!

Full RMNB Coverage of Caps at Penguins

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