Washington Capitals get swept by Penguins
The Washington Capitals blew a 3-1 lead and a 4-2 lead to the Pittsburgh Penguins on the road, faltering in overtime by a final of 4-3 thanks to Sidney Crosby winning the game.
After starting the season 2-0 with wins in Buffalo, the Caps dropped both contests to Pittsburgh but at least came away with a point in both games. They’ll face the Sabres this weekend in an empty Capital One Arena.
The Caps struck first at 4:55 as the third line created a 3 on 2 rush that turned into a 4 on 2 at the tail end. Richard Panik fed the puck to T.J. Oshie. Oshie went cross ice for Lars Eller, who banged it in for his first goal of the season.
The Penguins tied it at 16:52 on a goal from Colton Sceviour. Tom Wilson answered six seconds later. After winning the faceoff draw, Alex Ovechkin got the puck and fed it to Wilson who quickly fired to score.
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The Caps added one more before the period ended with 16.3 seconds left as Wilson crashed the net and scored his second goal of the game. The Caps took a 3-1 lead into the locker room and led in shots 11-5.
In the second the Penguins would get one back at 5:45 with a power play goal from Jake Guentzel. At 8:16 the Caps would answer with Evgeny Kuznetsov‘s first goal of the season. Kuznetsov glided toward the net and got a good pass from Daniel Sprong for the slam dunk. Jakub Vrana had the secondary assist.
Sadly the Caps wouldn’t be able to hang on to the 4-2 lead. To make matters worse they went to a 5 on 3 power play. Despite the two man advantage the Penguins would score a shorthanded goal thanks to Teddy Blueger at 15:07. Evgeni Malkin would tie the game with a power play goal at 17:15. Nobody would score in the third period as the game would go to overtime.
In the extra session Crosby would end the game 1:11 in for his third goal of the season. The Caps were outshot 30-26. The team went with Vitek Vanecek in goal for this game and he made 25 saves including 24 on even strength.
After playing their best period of the season in the opening 20 minutes the team failed to play a 60 minute game. Peter Laviolette told the media via Tarik El-Bashir of The Athletic (subscription required):
"“We shot ourselves in the foot in the second period with mental mistakes from all different areas. And we got outplayed in the third.”"
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The Caps will look for a better effort from start to finish with a weekend home series against the Buffalo Sabres beginning on Friday night at Capital One Arena in their home opener.