The Washington Capitals took on the Buffalo Sabres for the fourth time already in this new, strange season, and finally, took their first loss to the Jack Eichel led squad in a shootout 4-3.

The Sabres outshot the Caps 48 to 31 and out-attempted them at five-on-five 50 to 39.

• Stop me if you’ve heard this story before. The Caps played a good first period, terrible second period, and an even third period. I’m not too worried about the discrepancy in shot total and attempts as the bulk of those were taken by the Sabres in the first period from terrible positions on the ice, making life easy for Vitek Vanecek. After that, I thought the Caps decided to trade chances with the Sabres the rest of the game and that is probably not the best idea when you have who the Caps have missing from their lineup. Ultimately though they weren’t burned five-on-five as all three Sabres goals came up a man.
• The Caps handed the Sabres another five power plays. Some of the calls were questionable but the fact still remains that they just cannot stay out of the box. They’ve given up six power play goals against which is sixth from the bottom in the NHL and their penalty kill now sits 22nd in the NHL. Their net penalty differential is now minus-11 which is the second-worst total in the league behind only the St. Louis Blues at minus-12.
• Vanecek made 45 stops and is making a strong case to keep the crease even when Ilya Samsonov returns from his isolation.

Nicklas Backstrom is playing in his 962nd game, passing Peter Bondra for the third most games in franchise history.

— CapitalsPR (@CapitalsPR) January 24, 2021

• Zdeno Chara has struggled in the past handful of games. His pairing with Justin Schultz was burned for six of the Sabres nine high danger chances at five-on-five. This is something we need to keep an eye on. Schultz has been stellar with two other partners before this game.
• Connor McMichael made his NHL debut and I thought he didn’t look out of place at all. He ended the night with one shot on goal, two individual shot attempts, two individual scoring chances, one individual high danger chance, one minor penalty, and one faceoff win in one attempt.
• I want to see Daniel Sprong given an extended look in the lineup and maybe even higher in the lineup as well. His speed and heavy shot combination can be a game-changer and the Caps need some offensive jolt in their top-six right now.

Numbers thanks to Hockey-reference.com and NaturalStatTrick.com.

RMNB Coverage of Caps vs Sabres

Screenshot courtesy of NBC Sports Washington