The Caps hit the road for a back-to-back against Columbus and Ottawa this weekend, and it’s always good to try to bank those two points in the first game before playing tired against the second team. The Caps did just that against the Blue Jackets.
The first period was a fun back-and-forth between both teams, with both goalies coming up with some huge saves to keep the game at zeroes by the end of the first.
The second period, on the other hand, was much more favored to the Blue Jackets, who hemmed the Caps in their zone a lot. The good news is, the Caps didn’t give up too many dangerous chances against but the sustained pressure meant the Caps didn’t get much offense going…until Carlson ripped a bomb from the point towards the end of the period giving the Caps a 1-0 lead.
The Caps came out fast in the third period and, like they did against Seattle, scored two quick goals. The first goal was a Dylan Strome faceoff win that went right to Alex Ovechkin for #899. Shortly after, Logan Thompson made a nice pass to Ryan Leonard who threaded a pass to Justin Sourdif, sending him in on a breakaway to score his first as a Capital.
The Blue Jackets upped the pressure again after that, scoring their first goal of the game, and then appearing to score again shortly after, but thankfully after review it was determined to be kicked in so it didn’t count.
An elbowing penalty on Mathieu Olivier against Declan Chisholm gave the Caps a five-minute power play – and while usually (at least recently) the Caps have not done a good job of making teams pay on major penalties, they did this time. Both Tom Wilson and Connor McMichael cashed in to make it 5-1 Caps late in the game.
Overall, maybe not the best game for the Caps, but they went on the road without Pierre-Luc Dubois and Rasmus Sandin and stole two points thanks to Thompson playing incredibly well and the Caps cashing in when it counted. They get right back at it tonight against a young, fast, feisty team in the Ottawa Senators. They’ll need to find their legs quickly to try to pull some points out of this one.