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Buffalo lay beatdown on your favorite negative goal differential playoff team: Sabres beat Capitals 6-2

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📸: @hailey_merry/X

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The Washington Capitals were back in business on Tuesday night against the Buffalo Sabres. After some big wins from the Philadelphia Flyers and Detroit Red Wings, the Capitals needed to keep pace in the Eastern Conference with their own victory.

Martin Fehervary blasted the Capitals into an early lead but Buffalo responded with a tip-in try from Zemgus Girgensons and a slam dunk from JJ Peterka to take the lead heading into the first intermission. Peterka would strike again in the second period after Alex Tuch ripped off Nicolas Aube-Kubel. Dylan Strome cut the Buffalo lead to one with a power-play goal in the McNugget Minute.

Rasmus Dahlin, Tage Thompson, and Alex Tuch all scored in quick succession to put the game out of reach. Darcy Kuemper entered the game for a pulled Charlie Lindgren.

Sabres beat Capitals 6-2.

  • The Capitals started very well against the Sabres but had a bit of an overpassing spell that led to prime chances not being finished. Those chances going to waste cost them dearly as the final portion of the period was spent almost entirely in their own zone, leading to two Buffalo goals. There are way too many periods lately where the Caps come up with just four or five total shots. Correct me if I’m wrong but I don’t think that will ever be a viable strategy for an NHL team.
  • Martin Fehervary started the scoring in the game with his third goal of the season and then made a fantastic one-on-one defensive play on Alex Tuch. Tuch has to be seeing ghosts every time he’s in alone on a Capitals netminder wearing a white, road jersey…if you know, you know.
  • Congrats to the Sabres’ Jeff Skinner on being the first NHL player to play in his 1,000th NHL game but still look approximately 15 years old.

  • I really didn’t like the Capitals’ second period. Some weird line juggling went on and they needed to be bailed out by Charlie Lindgren standing on his head five or six times. Nicolas Aube-Kubel had the worst play of the period, getting stripped of the puck by Alex Tuch and then unsuccessfully trying to draw a penalty. Yes, in my opinion, that wasn’t a penalty.
  • The Capitals’ power play did eventually get to work though in the final minute of the frame. Mike Sgarbossa was chosen to take up the TJ Oshie spot which is an interesting choice but you can’t say he wasn’t playing well in the game before that. Dylan Strome potted his 26th goal of the campaign on that man advantage, tying Alex Ovechkin again for the team lead.
  • With Ovechkin’s assist on that marker, he tied our good ole pal Sergei Fedorov (696) for the second-most assists by a Russian-born player in NHL history. Evgeni Malkin holds the top spot there with 793 helpers.
  • Since I’m doing the recap tonight and we’re less than a week away from WrestleMania of course there’s going to be a pro wrestling bullet. Adrenaline in my soul, something something Cody Rhodes…needs to finish his story. Get that championship back on TV regularly, man. The Rock’s new entrance is truly god-like though.

  • I’m so tired of the Capitals just completely giving up even trying on defense in games like this. More than embarrassing. Haha so funny haha look at their goal differential was never actually funny. That now sits at -35. Okay, it’s kinda funny.
  • The Sabres have a fan that just starts shrieking “WOOOOO” like Ric Flair for no reason other than the arena sorta being quiet. It drove me insane the entire game to the point where I’m addressing it here. If you ever read this, please know that you live rent-free in my head through sheer insufferability.
  • At least we got several Simpsons impressions from Joe B. That’s my highlight of the night.

The Capitals will be back on home ice next against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday. Tom Wilson will be back from his six-game suspension.

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