Capitals bounce back against Lightning in Game 3 of our NHL 20 simulation
The Washington Capitals bounced back after two tough losses.
After dropping the last two games on the road in the Eastern Conference Finals, the virtual Washington Capitals took down the Lightning by a narrow 2-1 score.
Coming home, the Capitals were determined to get an early goal to keep the home crowd charged up. They had numerous scoring chances but couldn’t get a puck through the net.
Despite outshooting the Bolts 16-5, the Caps headed to the locker room at the first intermission down 1-0.
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Tampa’s goal came from Nikita Kucherov for his seventh of the spring, assisted by Ondrej Palat and Brayden Point at 2:11 to take the crowd out of the game. Despite Yanni Gourde getting called for hooking at 5:46, the Caps power play failed to tie the game.
The Caps kept pushing in the second period and finally got on the board at 2:38 with a goal from Alex Ovechkin on a slap shot right up the middle for his seventh goal of the playoffs. Evgeny Kuznetsov and T.J. Oshie had the helpers.
The Caps outshot the Lightning 9-7 and nearly would’ve gone to the locker room with the lead if that shot from Ilya Kovalchuk that was deflected by Andrei Vasilevskiy ricocheted into the net. Instead, it was 1-1 heading into the final period.
At 4:17, Kuznetsov was in front of the net to rebound a shot from John Carlson off the pads of Vasilevskiy to give the Caps the lead for good. Ovechkin was credited with a secondary assist.
From there it was all Braden Holtby, making save after save after save to protect the lead. The Caps were outshot 14-8 in the final period from a desperate Lightning team but Holtby turned away all 14. His night finished with 25 saves on 26 shots for a .962 save percentage.
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Now that the virtual Caps have got on the board in the series, will they be able to tie it up with another win on home ice? Check back tomorrow to find out!