Washington Capitals Beat Canadiens, Clinch Metropolitan Division

The Washington Capitals accomplished exactly what they needed to do this week. They locked up the Metropolitan Division.

Clinching the Metropolitan Division ensures the Washington Capitals home ice advantage in the first two rounds of the Stanley Cup playoffs. It also means they’ll draw whoever finishes first in the wild card, whomever that may be. If the season ended right now, it would be the Capitals going up against the Carolina Hurricanes in the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs.

Thankfully the season ends on Saturday and then after that we won’t have to do another one of those “if the season ended today” until next year. The Capitals have 104 points and improve their record to 48-28-8.

The Metro Division is locked up and won’t have to be decided on Saturday night when the Capitals host the New York Islanders and their former coach Barry Trotz in the regular season finale. Had this game been huge stakes, the playoffs would’ve had to start one game early. Now the Capitals have a chance to rest their starters and try some silly line combos.

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The Capitals have clinched the Metropolitan Division for four seasons in a row. That’s four out of five seasons since the division was formed in the 2013-14 season as part of a divisional realignment. What might shock you is that it recently has been rare for a defending Stanley Cup champion to win the division. According to the team, the Capitals are the third reigning Stanley Cup champion since the 2003-04 season to win their division. The other two teams were the 2011-12 Boston Bruins and the 2008-09 Detroit Red Wings.

The first period was back and fourth then got furious towards the end. Carl Hagelin forced a turnover forechecking Christian Folin near the boards. Hagelin got the puck to Brett Connolly, who flung a straight-across pass to Lars Eller to beat Canadiens goalie Carey Price and give the Capitals a 1-0 lead with 1:24 to go in the first. It was Eller’s 13th goal of the season.

With 1:03 left, Nicklas Backstrom was called for interference against Artturi Lehkonen, putting the Capitals on the penalty kill. They couldn’t execute. The Canadiens tied it on a power play goal from Shea Weber with 28 seconds to go. 1-1 would be the score after 20. The Canadiens outshot the Capitals 14-9.

The Capitals jumped back 2-1 in front at 2:58 in the second. Andre Burakovsky intercepted the puck and fed Nic Dowd a pass up the middle. Dowd finished for the snipe for his eighth goal of the season.

The Capitals had a much better second period. They outshot the Canadiens 11-7 in the second period to take a 2-1 lead into the locker room. Overall, shots were 22-20 Montreal.

The Capitals hung on in the third period. They were just narrowly outshot 12-11 in the final stanza and 34-31 total but Braden Holtby made some timely saves to protect the lead. The game was relatively clean with just two total penalties, one for each team, throughout the full 60 minutes.

As for Holtby he got the win stopping 33-of-34 shots for a .971 save percentage. After dropping a contest back on March 22nd to the Minnesota Wild, Holtby has won five games in a row. His record improves to 32-19-5.

The Capitals wrap up the regular season on Saturday night at Capital One Arena against the New York Islanders. It won’t be as big as originally anticipated but then again nothing is bigger than the playoffs anyway, which begin in just a few days. Puck drop is at 7 p.m.