It was a gorgeous autumn afternoon here in Frederick, Maryland, and I missed it not at all while I watched the Washington Capitals out-skill the New Jersey Devils on home ice.
Arseny Gritsyuk teamed up with Dawson Mercer to beat Logan Thompson and put the Devils up first. The Caps did not like that. Ryan Leonard, strapped to a rocket all day, carved through the Devils in a heroic end-to-end scoring play.
Ilya Protas got his first of the season (and first ever five-on-five goal) to kick off the second period. Dylan Strome finished off a glorious passing sequence, and then Boone Jenner extended his scoring streak. 4-1 after 40 minutes.
The Devils tilted the ice in the third period, but they beat Thompson just once – Timo Meier in the final minute.
Caps beat Devils 4-2!
- The Caps were down several important players. Justin Sourdif joined Pierre-Luc Dubois on the sick boy list. Matt Roy is still out. Freakin’ Jonny Brodzinski got a sweater.
- Possibly as a result, the Caps had a rough first period. Aside from breakaways, they struggled to gain the zone.
- The Caps had two minor penalties in that period, a crosscheck from Tuch and a high hit from Jenner, moving them temporarily into 31st place in penalty differential.
- My first note on the game was about a breakaway involving both Ryan Leonard and Cole Hutson. I wrote feels like the future.
- But what Leonard did next will be in his highlight reel when he retires in 2048.
- Logan Thompson probably didn’t love his coverage on the Gritsyuk goal, but he got an assist on Leonard’s goal, his first in about a year, when he assisted on Sourdif’s first goal as a Cap.
- Now that I’m a cord-cutter, I’m going to mention every time the Monumental app lets me down. It had been really good for the first couple weeks, but it wasn’t great on my cheap TCL earlier this week, and I had three upstream stutters today. It was all better in the back half of the game.
- Boone Jenner has four goals in the last five games, well on his way to the fabled 40-goal season that Chris invoked in one of his many eldritch tweets this year.
- Dylan Strome, finisher on the game’s best passing sequence, was the second intermission interview with Al Koken. I mention it only because he cited himself as only a “plus one” in the game. That’s a) accurate and b) unsurprising that he knows it, and c) fascinating he would disclose that he knows it in an interview. The man is a specimen and he deserves to be studied. Great passing with Jordan Kyrou though.
- Speaking of – Kyrou is doing the work. He has points in four of the last six games. The team needs to get him more shooting opportunities.
- Timothy Liljegren had a dismal game, even aside from his two minor penalties – a trip and a hold, the kind you do when you’re getting walked.
A bug is indeed going around the Caps locker room. And from the looks of this tie, the fashion bug has hit Joe Beninati. #joebsuitofthenight (1 PM edition)
— Good Skeet Pete (@peterhassett.net) 2026-10-17T17:03:42.495Z
Great game. Fun game. The kind of game that convinces your team it’s okay to overpass from now until a players-only meeting after Thanksgiving. The Caps didn’t own the puck in the first nor the third periods, but they generated chances when they could and finished nearly all of them.
The Caps will host no-win Kings (0-3-2) on Tuesday. Just say no to kings.
