This article is over 1 year old

Terrific third period on TJ1K celebration day secures two huge points: Capitals beat Jets 3-0

by

1 Comments

📸: @kurly from #crashers

Share:

The Washington Capitals and Winnipeg Jets did battle for the second time in two weeks on Sunday afternoon. The Capitals honored the great TJ Oshie pregame and hoped that his return to their lineup would help spur on a big two points against one of the Western Conference’s top teams.

John Carlson rocketed the Capitals into the lead with the first goal of the game at the beginning of the third period. Alex Ovechkin sorta accidentally scored the second goal of the game but they all count the same. Ovi grabbed another and it was much prettier than his first.

Capitals beat Jets 3-0!

  • The Capitals weathered an early Jets storm as the away side came out hot after a disappointing loss to the New York Islanders the night prior. Overall, the Caps ended up with a majority of the good chances in the opening frame but could not solve the best goaltender in the league, Connor Hellebuyck. Their first try on their super hot power play also looked much more like the man-advantage unit from earlier in the season aka it was terrible.
  • I really like the look of that line made up of Aliaksei Protas, Dylan Strome, and Ivan Miroshnichenko. Super complementary pieces that I think could put up really great numbers if they see an extended run together. Good to see Miro getting some more time on the power play as well.
  • The pregame ceremony for TJ Oshie was one of the better ones they’ve done and fitting for such a beloved member of the organization. So, so, so nice to see Nicklas Backstrom in attendance and Braden Holtby on the jumbotron as the first message for Oshie. We all dearly miss those two dudes.

  • Five straight periods against Winnipeg without a goal. The Jets bore you to death and have Hellebuyck stop all of the shots that you do get, and it has worked with aplomb for them this season. The Capitals had just 11 shot attempts in the second period and only three hit the target. Winnipeg didn’t exactly blitz them with their own chances but Charlie Lindgren definitely needed to come up with a handful of great stops while down a man.
  • Tough to see Sonny Milano depart the game early with an upper-body injury. He has been in a real groove since coming back from hopefully an unrelated upper-body injury earlier this season. The Capitals may need to put a pause on their mid-game demotion of Matthew Phillips now.
  • According to reports, a bird was flying around inside Capital One Arena during the game. Unfortunately, it was not Evgeny Kuznetsov trying to rejoin the Capitals.
  • Major shoutout to top Capitals prospect Ryan Leonard as he and the rest of the Boston College Eagles secured the Hockey East tournament championship on Saturday night. Leonard and company will now look to take down the NCAA championship in the next few weeks. Then he will hopefully sign with the Capitals and join up with this run to playoff qualification because that would be awesome.

  • I didn’t love how the Capitals played overall in the third period but they scored three times and Charlie Lindgren was still awesome. Two absolutely huge points in the standings that move them back into a playoff position. Lindgren now has five shutouts this season which ranks tied for second in the league.
  • Any weird bounce that leads to an Alex Ovechkin goal is a great bounce. The Great Eight’s 847th career goal was shot by both him and Connor McMichael at the same time and the league gave credit to Ovechkin for getting the last touch on the puck before it squeezed its way by Hellebuyck. He grabbed his 848th just minutes later with a beautiful move to his backhand.
  • Two assists for TJ Oshie on another big day for him. This team won’t ever be the same when he calls it quits. What a legend.

The Capitals will wrap up their four-game homestand on Tuesday against the Detroit Red Wings. Huge game for both teams as they fight one another for the second wild card playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

Related Articles

RMNB is not associated with the Washington Capitals; Monumental Sports, the NHLPA, the NHL, or its properties. Not even a little bit.

All original content on russianmachineneverbreaks.com is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International – unless otherwise stated or superseded by another license. You are free to share, copy, and remix this content so long as it is attributed, done for noncommercial purposes, and done so under a license similar to this one.

zamboni logo