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For the second consecutive game the Capitals had trouble with a less than spectacular opponent. Last Saturday the Panthers were able to hold the Capitals to a single goal through 65 minutes, but the Capitals were still able to come away with the win. They were not as fortunate last night. Despite some strong possession play, particularly in the third, the Capitals fell to the Oilers 3-2 in regulation.
Ten more notes on the game:
- Yesterday we noted that the Capitals have been doing a good job limiting shots against, that trend persisted last night. The Capitals only allowed the Oilers 20 shots, unfortunately 3 of them found their way into the back of the net.
- Going into last night’s action the Caps had won 8-straight games that Dave Jackson was officiating, Unfortunately that streak came to an end. Each team had two power play opportunities and cashed in on one.
- Speaking of cashing in on power-play opportunities…a sweet no-look pass from Nicklas Backstrom led to a John Carlson power-play goal in the first period, It was Backstrom’s 500th point in his 501st game. He is the first player to reach the 500 point plateau in his draft class.
- Mike Green is having a very strong start to the season, he tallied his third goal of the year about 5 minutes into the second to give the Capitals a very brief two-one lead. It took Green 25 games to score his first goal last season.
- For the first time this year the Capitals gave up a goal within two minutes of scoring one themselves. Last season the Capitals allowed those quick strikes 29 times. When you consider that the Capitals scored 225 goals, you can determine that the Caps allowed a return tally 12.88% of the time they scored a goal. That is a higher percentage than the Panthers scored on the PP last year.
- Despite putting up strong puck possession numbers, the Capitals’ top line of Ovechkin-Backstrom-Brouwer has not scored an even strength goal in over 8 periods.
- Andre Burakovsky got back on the score sheet last night when he set up Mike Green’s second period goal.. He has points in 5 of his first 6 NHL games. The sample size is small, but it is starting to look like Burakovsky improves the puck possession numbers of whomever he is playing with.
- Alexander Ovechkin had some awful luck lead to the Oilers’ second goal of the night. The puck got away from him near the offensive blue line, and was taken coast to coast for a goal by Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. His miscue was one of his first under Barry Trotz.
- The Caps outplayed and out-possessed the Oilers for much of the night. Washington had a 5v5 Corsi For and Corsi For Close% of 64.7%.
- The Capitals’ allowed a power-play goal from Nikita Nikitin near the end of the second that ended up as the game winning goal. This was the second consecutive game that the Capitals have surrendered a goal while short handed.
You can’t win them all, a regulation loss was inevitably going to happen at some point. The Capitals are doing the right things, and the right things should lead to more wins down the line.
Game highlights: