Did Alex Ovechkin score? He did! 11 to go…
Plus: After falling behind 1-0 in the first period, the Caps did a decent job of keeping Tampa’s big guns and their high-octane offense in check, allowing them only nine shots on goal after Mitchell Chafee’s opening tally (although the eighth of those, Tampa’s first shot of the third period, ended up going in). And of course an Ovi goal is always a plus.
Minus: The Caps almost took an early lead in this one when a shot from Jakob Chychrun beat Andrei Vasilevskiy. Unfortunately before he took that shot, he batted down the puck with a high stick that was missed by officials but not by the Tampa bench, who challenged the play and won. It probably would have been called back for goalie interference if it wasn’t the high stick, because there was a Capital within 10 feet of an opposing goaltender when the puck went in…
Our three stars:
*** Alex Ovechkin (1G, 16 shot attempts)
** Mitchell Chafee (1G, 3 SOG)
* Andrei Vasilevskiy (21 saves)