The Washington Capitals grabbed the full two points on the road in Buffalo after coming up empty at home in two straight. The 4-3 shootout victory gives the team momentum heading into the back half of a back-to-back against the New Jersey Devils.
Go get all four.
- The Capitals statistically played an overall dominant game against the Buffalo Sabres but suffered through a handful of stretches where they just couldn’t get out of their own zone and were punished for that. So, we ended up with a shootout thriller instead of a lopsided road victory. All in all, the Caps outshot Buffalo 40 to 23 and got the two points after two straight home regulation losses. That’ll do.
- Evgeny Kuznetsov extended his point streak to 11 games with an assist. Caps PR says only ten players this season have had a point streak of at least 11 games. Kuzy is on pace for his fourth career season with at least 70 points.
- The Caps are now tied with the Boston Bruins and Pittsburgh Penguins for the most road wins in the NHL with 21.
Alex Ovechkin is now 30 goals away from Gordie Howe after scoring his 771st against the Sabres.
And oh yeah, he also won the game for the Capitals in the shootout. https://t.co/G3aEy9idXn
— RMNB (@rmnb) March 26, 2022
- Ilya Samsonov didn’t have a ton of work to do in his 20-save win but he was excellent when it really mattered in both the overtime and the shootout.
- The first line was once again the Caps’ most successful five-on-five. In those minutes, the team held a plus-6 shot attempt differential, a plus-2 scoring chance differential, and did not give up a single high danger chance while creating two of their own.
- Hendrix Lapierre had a huge night for the Acadie-Bathurst Titan in the QMJHL. The Caps 2020 first-round draft pick put up a five-point game and now has 47 points in 32 games.
Numbers thanks to Hockey-reference.com and NaturalStatTrick.com.
