Live updates: Washington Capitals vs Tampa Bay Lightning at Benchmark International Arena

The Washington Capitals are losers of five of their last six. Now, they’re in Florida to try and reverse their losing ways.

Tonight, our heroes will take on the Tampa Bay Lightning, who have won six of their last seven games. Ethen Frank will get back into the lineup in favor of Sonny Milano while Justin Sourdif will move to third line center and skate with Hendrix Lapierre and Ryan Leonard.

The game is the Capitals’ third in four nights and marks the second of their current four-game road trip.

Puck drop for tonight’s game is shortly after 7:00 pm. Joe Beninati and Craig Laughlin have the call on Monumental Sports Network 2.

Lines

Washington Capitals

Tampa Bay Lightning

Tunnel shenanigans

1st Period

Puck is dropped. Duhaime-Dowd-Frank and Sandin-TVR get the start.

Lightning humming in the offensive zone already. Nikita Kucherov with a huge one-timer from the right circle. Logan Thompson makes a big save.

Ethen Frank with a great pass to give Doggie his first goal of the year.

Lilleberg completely unguarded coming down the seam as both Ryan Leonard and Hendrix Lapierre don’t guard him. Third line gonna watch a lot of the game tonight on the bench after that one.

Brayden Point robbed on a two-on-one. How did Logan get over in time??!!

Capitals go to their first power play of the night as Emil Lilleberg hooks Justin Sourdif at 11:07.

Aliaksei Protas to the box for high-sticking Kucherov off a faceoff at 13:59. Let me just note: that was not a high stick at all what was the ref looking at.

At intermission: The Lightning lead 2-1. The Capitals are outshooting Tampa 13 to 7 and out-attempting them at 5v5, 20 to 9.

2nd Period

Puck is dropped. Per MNST, the Capitals are 1-3-1 when trailing after one period.

Alex Ovechkin wide open from the middle of the circles, but Vasilevskiy makes the save.

Leonard rips his shot off Dominic James’ face, the puck ramped up after being blocked, and he sprinted off the ice. I hope he’s all right. Scary.

Hagel high-sticks Rasmus Sandin in the visor — an actual high stick — but no call by the officials.

Hagel with multiple chances on a two-on-one but Logan stands strong.

Dominic James is back on the ice for a shift with around 7 minutes remaining.

Tom Wilson catches a puck out of mid-air and springs himself on a breakaway. He dekes and is stopped by Vasilevskiy’s left pad.

Charle-Edouard D’Astous tries to lay out Alex Ovechkin in the neutral zone with a big hit. Instead, he took the brunt of it.

Ryan McDonagh is out for the remainder of the game due to injury.

Logan Thompson run over by Brandon Hagel. Full on scrap — mostly hugging. Tom Wilson stupidly hit him into the goalie. Thompson is to the bench getting his skate blade put back on.

Jack Finley and Ryan Leonard off for roughing penalties at 16:49. Play going to four-on-four.

Erik Cernak scores for the Capitals. What a great game-tying goal by the Lightning defenseman!

At intermission: The game is tied 2-2. The Capitals are outshooting the Lightning 23 to 15 and out-attempting them 38 to 25 at 5v5.

3rd Period

Puck is dropped.

Both teams going back and forth five-on-five. Great game.

Hagel shifts into the center of the ice and beats Thompson between the circles. That’s the first time Thompson has given up more than two goals in a game since last April.

Aliaksei Protas pivots to the middle of the ice and springs himself wide open down but can’t beat Vasilevskiy.

Victor Hedman (slashing) and Tom Wilson (cross-checking) off the ice at 16:12. Four-on-four hockey.

John Carlson takes a really silly hooking penalty with 1:38 remaining. If the Caps are going to tie, they’re going to have to do it shorthanded.

Nikita Kucherov scores an empty-net goal, but he put himself offside entering the offensive zone. There’s 15.1 seconds left.

Chychrun and Cernak fight after the buzzer and Jakob just absorbed punch after punch after punch. Hope he’s okay.

Capitals lose 3-2. They outshoot the Lightning 30-19.

Reverse halo effect: Lightning beat Caps 3-2

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