Plus: Hard to pick anything else other than the newly put together third line involving Sonny Milano, Hendrix Lapierre, and Alexei Protas. They contributed to three goals. Both Protas and Lapierre had three points. That line is made up of 27 year old and younger players. Great to see the youth producing.
Minus: Find something that hates each other more than Caps and challenging goals. In what should have been an obvious goalie interference on Charlie Lindgren, the refs somehow saw it differently, putting the Blue Jackets within one.
Key Moment: Since Caps lost the challenge the Blue Jackets were given a power play with a chance to tie the game up, but the Caps penalty killers came up big again and stifled that opportunity. It could have easily been the turning point the wrong way but the Caps didn’t allow it.
Caps Player of the Game: It’s obviously going be someone from that third line. Hard to choose but I’ll go with big man Protas. His goal was pure snipe and one of his assists was a beautiful primary pass.
Final Thoughts: It was another up and down game by the Caps but they keep battling and pulling out wins. They faced a lot of adversity with the lost challenge and nail biting end. The young line produced which is always a good sign for an older team. You want to see a more dominant win by the Caps but getting healthier and more consistent time together could start helping those type of game being more prevalent.