Andrew Mangiapane was a late scratch against the Dallas Stars on Monday night due to illness.
Nearly 24 hours later, he scored one of the most beautiful goals of the Washington Capitals’ 2024-25 season.
“Don’t know what happened there,” Mangiapane said at intermission, “but happy how it went into the net.”
What happened there was Mangiapane dangled past Blackhawks defenseman TJ Brodie down the right wing, putting the puck through his legs, curling in front of the net, and beating a frozen Arvid Soderblom with an emphatic shot into the net.
Or as the Capitals put it simply:
toe drag release
toe drag release
toe drag release
toe drag release
toe drag release pic.twitter.com/w10t6NSuwc— Washington Capitals (@Capitals) December 18, 2024
“WOOOOOOOOOOOO!” a smiling Mangiapane could be heard yelling as his teammates skated over for hugs in a near-silent United Center.
“I don’t know,” Mangiapane said. “Just happy to be playing tonight, obviously wasn’t feeling the best yesterday. Just being able to come out here and play was nice.”
The tally was Mangiapane’s seventh goal of the season — Lars Eller and Jakub Vrana got the primary and secondary assists respectively — and it came on the very next shot after Pierre-Luc Dubois put the Capitals up 1-0.
The goals gave the Caps a 2-0 lead going into the first intermission.
