The Washington Capitals desperately needed a win against the Buffalo Sabres. A crucial victory over the Detroit Red Wings had put them back into a playoff spot after a six-game losing streak, but both the Red Wings and Pittsburgh Penguins were hot on their heels in a tight race — with one guaranteed to earn two points Thursday night.
Meanwhile, the recently-eliminated Sabres had nothing left to play for but pride. The Capitals lost anyway.
With three games remaining, the Caps may be all out of chances: they’re not quite eliminated yet, but they no longer control their own destiny. Goaltender Charlie Lindgren grappled with the loss postgame, faced with what could soon be the end of the season.
After starting the season as backup to Darcy Kuemper, Lindgren’s stellar play not only earned him a starting role for the first time in the NHL, but also saw him near-singlehandedly save the Capitals’ season on a myriad of occasions. He nearly doubled his starts from last season with 45 and recorded a career-high five shutouts. But now, his playoff dreams felt further and further away.
“Listen, it’s it’s been a really fun year,” Lindgren said. “It’s been a really good year. But to me, if we come up short, it doesn’t mean as much.”
A familiar story played out against the Sabres as the Capitals struggled to come back from a first-period deficit. Head coach Spencer Carbery noted that the same patterns that have plagued his group all season showed up again on Thursday.
“Especially early on, I thought we did a really good job of executing exactly what we wanted to from a game plan standpoint, and then it becomes, a little bit of a microcosm of our season, right?” he explained. “That’s what’s happened so many times is because we struggled to score and finish, make that last play individually and collectively, then it becomes like when it doesn’t go in for us and you get those shot attempts and those opportunities and they’re missing and they’re missing and missing.”
He later added: “This is no different for us as coaches. This has been the way our team has gone all year. And if we get a couple goals there, and now we’ll protect that lead. If we don’t and we trail, now it becomes a challenge. And that’s what you saw tonight.”
Perhaps even more frustrating was that the loss came despite what the team saw as a relatively strong performance. Per Natural Stat Trick, the Capitals out-chanced the Sabres 31-17 and held three-quarters of the night’s high-danger chances (12-4). They killed off the Sabres’ only power play. Connor McMichael brought the game within one late in the second and Tom Wilson even netted a goal in the final minute. None of it mattered.
“I think we played pretty well,” Nic Dowd said. “We did what we wanted to do for, call it 45 minutes of the game. And you would’ve liked to see one of those tips that Willy (Tom Wilson) scores at the end go in sometime in the middle of the game, because I thought we put a lot of pucks on the net in good spots and we forechecked well. But I think that’s just how it goes sometimes.”
“Honestly, I thought we controlled play for most of the game,” Connor McMichael said. “For sure, wasn’t the one of the worst games we’ve played lately, but we didn’t win.”
Once the game was over, though, players reckoned with what was, if not a season-ending loss, at least one that drastically reduced their odds.
“Anytime you lose at this time of the year, it’s an opportunity missed,” said McMichael. “And this one doesn’t feel good for sure, but there’s nothing we can do now. It’s on to the next one and we’ve got to keep winning.”
Still, the team was sure to point out, not all is yet lost. While most years an 85-point squad would have no hopes of making the postseason, a wide-open Eastern Conference just might give them a chance.
And as to how they’ll keep the faith?
“The same way we have since January 1st,” Carbery said with a wry smile. “It will not change. Our group, won’t be deterred and we will continue to play and do the things that we’ve done since we’ve been on the edge of elimination it feels like for two months.”
