WASHINGTON, DC — The Washington Capitals jumped into the Eastern Conference’s second wild card spot on Saturday night with a high-energy 4-2 victory over the Tampa Bay Lightning. After losing seven of their last eight contests, the Capitals knew that another loss would virtually eliminate their chances of climbing back into the playoff picture.
An already high-stakes game took on even more personal meaning late in the first period when a hit from Michael Eyssimont left Nick Jensen motionless after a collision with the boards. Jensen was ultimately able to walk out of the arena with his family, but the injury rattled his teammates, who watched for several minutes as Jensen was stretchered off the ice.
“It’s tough,” John Carlson said postgame. “It’s tough to even go back out there after something scary like that, you know, just like I’m sure you guys felt, we feel probably a hundred times worse being down here. We tried to muster up everything we could for him.”
Officials called a halt to the period with 1:31 remaining, allowing players to collect themselves before playing the remainder of the game. Goaltender Charlie Lindgren summed up the team’s mindset in the locker room during that intermission.
“At the end of the day we just wanted to play like Jensen,” he said. “That’s hard and it’s the right way and I thought we did that. Credit to the guys in here because it’s not easy seeing a brother go down like that.”
On another night, the remaining two periods could have turned into chaos as players sought revenge for their fallen friend. But with so much on the line, the Capitals knew that their top priority remained securing two more points in the standings.
“If we throw our season away, Jens would probably [say], ‘You idiots. Don’t do that. Go out there and win a game for me and I’ll get better,’” head coach Spencer Carbery noted after the win. “That’s what they did. So I give them a ton of credit as they’ve shown once again to find the character and the wherewithal to be mentally tough enough to focus and find a way to get two points and keep us in this fight.”
“I think we did a good job navigating. It’s tough. To turn it into mayhem — easily we could have,” Carlson said. “I’m sure Jens would want us to get the win more than to avenge him.”
Despite good looks at each end of the ice, strong goaltending efforts from both Lindgren and Andrei Vasilevskiy kept the score tied at two through the second period. The game’s turning point came in the third period after a pair of Tampa Bay penalties gave the Caps a two-man advantage for 1:07.
The Bolts escaped the first penalty unscathed, but John Carlson scored the go-ahead goal just five seconds later. Carbery credited his team for their perseverance after the unsuccessful five-on-three.
“It’s very easy for that next minute to just be — that’s normally what happens — is the next minute you throw out the window,” he said, later adding, “to not be deterred, or just because we didn’t score on the five on three, to just throw in the towel and say, ‘well, we’re not scoring on this power play. Let’s get this game overtime,’ it’s a big, big moment in that game.”
Nic Dowd, who would fight Eyssimont in the second period, sealed the game with a goal in the final five minutes, earning praise from Carbery in the locker room.
“So one of his (Jensen’s) brothers steps up, has a huge scrap,” Carbery said. “But hold on, the scrap is one thing, he steps up for us. But then he plays his ass off to get the win. Scores a huge f***ing goal. Nic Dowd.”
The team roared. Carbery also gave shoutouts to Lindgren (winning goaltender), Carlson (game-winning goal), and Alex Ovechkin (big shot block).
Washington is now without all of Nick Jensen, Rasmus Sandin, and Ethan Bear on the back end as they face a final pair of must-win games before the potential end of their season.
“I know a lot of guys like to look at standings a lot,” Dowd said. “We can only control what we can control and that’s what we did tonight. Everything falls on us now, right? Everything that’s in this room. These next two games, this entire season comes down to our group being able to get to where we need to be and do it together.”
