Let’s be honest, this one had the makings of being a rough outing from the start. Between a matinee game, on the road, on national television, and a day removed from trading away John Carlson…it’s amazing the Caps performed as well as they did.
Plus: Jakob Chychrun’s move to set up what was essentially an empty net for Aliaksei Protas for the Caps’ first goal was absolutely ridiculous in the best possible way. Slick, slick moves from #6.
Minus: We’re going to lump this into one category called “everything to do with penalties”. A lot of bad calls (going both ways but definitely tilted against the Caps), giving up a power play goal (although only ceding one, considering, was a win), not scoring on their own opportunities, a missed call (that easily would have been the most obvious of the calls made today) that denied the Caps a two-man advantage…just pretty painful all the way around.
Caps Player of the Game: Player of the game – and probably the season – has to be Logan Thompson, who did his best despite getting very little support from the guys in front of him.