The Washington Capitals are in the win column after their second game of the 2025-26 NHL season. The Caps put together a near-complete performance against the New York Islanders in a 4-2 road win on Saturday night, creating and finishing their chances en route to two standings points.
Great game to get things on track this fall after an unlucky shooting night against the Bruins. Hopefully, they come up with some of the same magic against the Rangers later tonight. A full New York sweep sounds sweet to me.
#NHL GameScore Impact Card for Washington Capitals on 2025-10-11
#ALLCAPS
— HockeyStatCards (@hockeystatcards.com) October 11, 2025 at 10:05 PM
- Your first reaction to my title for this post, referencing a “dominant win,” might be confusion, but I assure you: yes, this two-goal win was still a dominant one. The Capitals controlled play at five-on-five in all three periods, with the Islanders only making their way back into the game for short stints and never without a response from the Caps. To start the game, the Isles recorded just three total shots in the first period, and by the time they started ramping things up, they were already down 4-0. The score- and venue-adjusted five-on-five stats give the Capitals 60.6 percent of the shot attempts, 62.6 percent of the scoring chances, and 72.4 percent of the high-danger chances.
- The only area of the game where the Capitals faltered, leading me to call their effort “near-complete,” was on the penalty kill. It’s an obviously very small sample size, but the Capitals have been scored on three times in the five total times they’ve been shorthanded in two games. The Islanders created six of their 13 total high-danger chances while up a man.
- Aliaksei Protas was the star of the show, as he was many times last season. The big Belarusian recorded his seventh career three-point game in the victory, scoring his first two goals of the season. Overall, Protas notched the three points (2g, 1a), five shots on goal, eight shot attempts, seven individual scoring chances, four individual high-danger chances, and two drawn penalties. He is the club’s current leading scorer with four points (2g, 2a) in two games.
- Jakob Chychrun had another very good game, assisting on two of the team’s goals to give him three assists through two games this season. With him on the ice at five-on-five, the Capitals saw heavily positive differentials in shot attempts (+14), scoring chances (+7), and high-danger chances (+2). They also scored three of their four goals during his time on the ice.
- I don’t normally save a bullet for an opposing player, but Matthew Schaefer of the Islanders was incredibly impressive in just his second career NHL game. This kid turned 18 on September 5 and played 26:04 of ice time against a Capitals team that was the best in the Eastern Conference last year. I still think his goal should have been taken off the board, but even outside of that, he led the Islanders in shots on goal (8), shot attempts (14), and individual scoring chances (6). He’s going to be a problem in the Metro for a long time. What a skater.
- Logan Thompson was rock solid yet again, stopping 1.37 more goals than expected. He made 34 saves on 36 shots faced. Thompson will likely get his first game off on Sunday as Charlie Lindgren is set for his season debut against the Rangers. Lindgren won his lone start against the Rangers last year, making 15 saves in a 3-2 overtime win on March 5.
Numbers thanks to Hockey-Reference, NaturalStatTrick, and HockeyStatCards.
