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Capitals vs Penguins Recap: A Wonderful Willy Winner

NHL Gamecenter – Natural Stat Trick

The Capitals came into Thursday Night’s tilt against the Pittsburgh Penguins treading water. Sure, their 22 points were good enough to stand alone in second place in the Mass Mutual Division, but that was only one up on the Penguins, the Flyers, and the Islanders, with each of the first two having at least a game in hand. Meanwhile, the Caps hadn’t exactly been setting the track on fire of late, dropping two of their last three, and that one win requiring comeback heroics to avoid a weekend sweep at the hands of the lowly Rangers and Devils. The Caps held on for an important-if-not-pretty win, and clawed back two of the points they’ve been in the habit of relinquishing to the Pens.

Here’s Thursday evening’s Plus/Minus:

Plus: T.J. Oshie’s spectacular goal. Scroll down for for the goodness on repeat.

Minus: Another lead against the Penguins, another lead blown. Regardless of outcome, the blown leads (not just against Pittsburgh…but especially against Pittsburgh) are a hideous, untenable trend.

And now this…

Here are some more notes on Thursday game:

6. The Caps looked great in the second stanza, owning 70% of shot attempts and 70% of expected goals at five-on-five, which made it all the more disappointing that they weren’t able to extend their one-goal lead before heading into intermission, and given their recent history with these leads, as well as their overtime failures against this Penguins team, the odor of familiar disappointment was beginning to permeate the air…

7. Instead, T.J. Oshie scored an absolutely incredible goal. It was big because it gave the Caps a two-goal lead in the third period, and it was, amazingly his first 5v5 tally on the season, but forget all of that for a second, and just drink it in.

8. But if you thought the Caps would have a moment of blissful cushion, you were wrong, because despite the favorable outcome that the powerplay they drew right after going up by two goals would suggest, Brandon Tanev scored shorthanded to bring the game back within one.

9. And then Jake Guentzel tied it up, because of course he did. Vanecek needs to make this save.

10. On a late game power play, Evgeny Kuznetsov teed up a slapshot that broke Kris Letang’s stick. The Caps’ powerplay put on a clinic for exposing a stickless defender for the next thirty seconds, and the powerplay terminated with Tom Wilson putting the puck in the back of the net off a pretty John Carlson feed, and the Caps taking a 3-2 lead. Carl Hagelin and Lars Eller would add empty netters to salt the game away.

Hope to see you all back here on Saturday afternoon for another matinee tilt against the Devils in New Jersey.

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