The Washington Capitals looked like they were cruising through Wednesday’s game against the New York Islanders after two periods. Despite the close scoreline, the Caps were controlling most of the play headed into the final frame.
That’s where things went downhill. The Islanders took it to them in the third and the Capitals had to hang on for dear life.
- Through forty minutes, the Capitals were out-pacing the Islanders at five-on-five in shot attempts (37 to 22), scoring chances (16 to 12), and high-danger chances (10 to 7). That turned around in the third as New York found a second, third, and fourth life. The Capitals faced a deluge of five-on-five shot attempts (29) and were out-high danger chanced 6 to 0. They got through it and took the full two points as OT winners on the back of their goaltender.
- Darcy Kuemper, after allowing a pretty soft opening strike to the Islanders, locked it in from there and made 30 saves in the 3-2 overtime victory. Kuemper has been stellar in his last three starts, going 3-0 with a 1.61 goals-against average, a .947 save percentage, and 2.92 goals saved more than expected.
- The big story of the night was the debut of 2022 first-round draft selection Ivan Miroshnichenko. Miroshnichenko skated 10:13 of ice time in the win, 40 seconds of that coming with the Capitals up a man. I thought he looked great and deserving of a longer look in the lineup. You can tell he has special offensive potential and just needs to play more games before things become even easier for him. The youngster finished with two shots on goal and three hits.
Alex Ovechkin assisted on Dylan Strome's overtime goal and climbed another all-time NHL list in the @Capitals' win.#NHLStats: https://t.co/ktw36LhgHD pic.twitter.com/z5agSFkBRz
— NHL Public Relations (@PR_NHL) December 21, 2023
- Nicolas Aube-Kubel finished third on the entire team and first among forwards in five-on-five ice time. I know some of you don’t like to hear this, but the fourth line? Still plays way too much. I hope in the second half of this back-to-back that Spencer Carbery unleashes his more offensively potent lines a little more after every single forward on the team’s top three trios played less at five-on-five than NAK (17:28), Nic Dowd (14:49), and Beck Malenstyn (14:24).
- The Capitals most effective line was yet again the one featuring Aliaksei Protas and Anthony Mantha on the wings. Although Connor McMichael was replaced by Hendrix Lapierre, that unit was still on the ice for both of the team’s regulation goals and neither of the Islanders’ strikes. I thought Lapierre was great overall, especially in the first period, recording his third-career NHL goal and adding an assist on Joel Edmundson’s tally.
- Dylan Strome grabbed the game-winner, his 13th goal overall this season and his eighth in the third period or later. Strome is still on pace for over 35 goals which would be more than 10 over his previous career-high.
Numbers thanks to Hockey-reference.com and NaturalStatTrick.com.
