The Washington Capitals will rematch the Toronto Maple Leafs a little over a week after a 7-3 shellacking at home.
The Capitals don’t necessarily need this game after winning six of their last seven games. They’ve already catapulted into the second wild card spot in the East, but another W would sure be nice.
With a Capitals victory (81 standings points) and a Philadelphia Flyers’ loss tonight (82) — our Pennsylvania pals play the Montreal Canadiens — Washington will jump into the third and final guaranteed playoff spot in the Metropolitan Division. If the Flyers lose in overtime or the shootout and the Capitals win in any fashion, the two will tie and the Caps will jump ahead of them based solely on points percentage.
So those are the stakes, ppl. Can I have a Let’s Go Caps?
Tonight’s game is airing on Monumental Sports Network. Joe Beninati and Craig Laughlin will have the call. Puck drop is a little after 7:00 pm.
Lines
Washington Capitals
Scratches: Matthew Phillips and Vincent Iorio.
Toronto Maple Leafs
Tunnel weirdness
1st Period
Charlie Lindgren will oppose Joseph Woll in net. Ovechkin-McMichael-Oshie and Fehervary-Carlson get the start.
Alex Ovechkin just laid out Jake McCabe at center ice. Wow. Huge hit.
Off a faceoff, Ovechkin just walloped Mark Giordano off a faceoff. The play draws a penalty after Gio responds by punching Ovi in the head. Time of penalty 4:30.
Nic Dowd to the box for tripping Simon Beniot at 7:21
🚨 1-0 Leafs. Mark Giordano, a forty-year-old defenseman, beats Lindgren top corns. He was left wide open in the slot. Time of goal 10:09.
Joseph Woll with a huge save on Nick Jensen down low.
Nick Jensen wide open down low, appears to hit the post and out of play.
The Leafs outshot the Capitals 19 to 9 in the first period. At five-on-five though, shot attempts were 20 to 20 and the Capitals had more high-danger chances, 6 to 5.
2nd Period
Puck is dropped.
🚨 2-0 Leafs. Tyler Bertuzzi takes the puck off the end boards and banks it off Lindgren’s bad and in. Time of goal is 18 seconds.
Max Domi hits the crossbar on a breakaway where he had like 10 steps on the next closest Capitals player. The horn goes off, everyone stops playing. The Capitals have an opportunity for a 2-on-0 but dump the puck in and fritter that away.
🚨 2-1 Leafs. Nic Dowd with a beautiful deflection of a Nick Jensen point shot to get the Caps on the board. Another point for Hendrix Lapierre too. Good hockey! Time of goal 5:27.
For Dowd, he now has 10-plus goals for the fourth-straight season.
🚨 3-1 Leafs. With a loose puck in front of the net, Connor Dewar does a spinarama on his backhand and scores. Ryan Reaves gets the primary assist on the play. Dylan Strome missed on a chance on the other end right before this. Time of goal 11:38.
Leafs are leading in shots on goal 33 to 19 and five-on-five shot attempts 44 to 33.
3rd Period
Puck is dropped.
🚨 4-1 Leafs. Another early period goal for the Leafs. This time it’s Bobby McMann 1:06 in.
🚨 5-1 Leafs. TVR just handed it to Tyler Bertuzzi right in front of the net as he tried to break out. Time of goal 10:11.
Lindgren’s been great. Leafs are just really good and Caps skaters can’t handle it.
Caps lose 5-1. Leafs outshoot them 48 to 25 and out-attempt them 66 to 50 at five-on-five.
Read the RMNB recap:
Comment on the game below along with us! The comment section will close shortly after the game ends and we hope you’ll continue the conversation in RMNB’s recap.
