Even though they have won their last two games at Bridgestone Arena, the Washington Capitals have somewhat of a longstanding annual “Embarrass Themselves in Nashville” tradition. After the first period last night, it certainly looked like that’s where they were headed—they were outscored 1-0 and outshot 8-4 by the Nashville Predators. TJ Oshie tied things up with a 5-on-3 PPG five minutes into the middle frame, but that was the Caps’ only goal all game. The team struggled to convert despite their strong puck possession and zone time, and the Preds jumped on a defensive miscue in the second to regain the lead and take the wind out of Washington’s sails.
Three Takeaways:
- The Caps had a slow start to yesterday’s game, and it once again came back to bite them. Going into last night, the Capitals were 3-7-2 when trailing after the first period this season; that record gets worse on the road at 0-4-1. The Predators won a 6-5 game in overtime in Raleigh on Friday night, so theoretically the Caps should have been the stronger team right after the puck was dropped in Nashville. Unfortunately, that was far from what happened. They only had four shots on goal through the first 20 minutes, and two of them were from defensemen from over 150 feet away from the Nashville crease.
- Juuse Saros has been absolutely unreal for the Predators lately. According to Dmitri Filipovic, Saros has nine wins, 19 goals against, a 937 SV%, and a 943 5v5 SV% in his last 10 starts. Nashville is getting mind-blowingly good goaltending from him, and the Caps got the short end of that stick last night. Granted, the Caps didn’t test Saros too hard and only recorded 22 shots on goal
- Live footage of all of us waiting for Alex Ovechkin to score again:
They Said It: