Capitals fall to Flyers
The Washington Capitals fell on the road to the Philadelphia Flyers 3-2 on a late shorthanded goal in the second period.
It ended a four game losing streak for the Flyers. As for the Washington Capitals, it ended a nice three-game winning streak that included an emotional road win over the Carolina Hurricanes, a jolting come from behind win over the San Jose Sharks and a thrashing of the Ottawa Senators.
The Flyers struck first at 3:24 on a goal from Travis Konecny. Nicklas Backstrom evened the score with a snipe in front of the net off a pass from Tom Wilson at 7:11 for his ninth goal of the season.
Jakub Vrana gave the Caps the lead with a nice shot up the middle in front of the net off a backhanded pass by Evgeny Kuznetsov at 12:34. It was Vrana’s 19th goal of the season. Michal Kempny had the secondary assist.
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Robert Hagg tied the game at 19:18 and 2-2 would be the score heading to the locker room for the first intermission. The Flyers led in shots 13-8.
In the second Sean Couturier was called for slashing Nick Jensen, putting the Caps on the power play at 17:33. Despite this, the Caps gave up a shorthanded goal 25 seconds later to Kevin Hayes that would turn out to be the game-winning goal for the Flyers.
The Caps had the edge in shots 11-3 in the second period while being outshot 11-9 in the third. The Caps outshot the Flyers 28-27 overall but went 0-for-5 on the power play.
Capitals coach Todd Reirden told NHL.com after the game:
“You have a game plan going into back-to-back games, certain key things that have given us success all year. One of them has been goals in the first or last minutes of games. We give up a goal so that they get some momentum at the end of the first … and special teams are always important, we give up a shorthanded goal. Those two things, coupled with an unforced error on their first goal, we had to fight against it tonight. Disappointed in those areas of our game.”
In the loss, Braden Holtby stopped 24 of the 27 shots he faced for a .889 save percentage. He added in the same article:
“It was one of those games where you play pretty good in the second period, and the breakaway is a save I would like to have for the guys, but I thought it was a pretty evenly matched game. They’re a good team. A couple plays here and there that went their way.”
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The Capitals will look to bounce back this Saturday night when they host the New Jersey Devils with puck drop at 7 p.m.