Capitals drop to 0-2 after loss to Maple Leafs

It was a better effort than the night before but in the end it was the same result for the Washington Capitals, a big fat L. This one probably stings more for the players considering they lost to Ilya Samsonov after he threw shade at Alex Ovechkin weeks ago saying that Auston Matthews has a harder shot than him.

John Tavares put the Maple Leafs up early at 6:40 on a power play goal. The Caps evened it up at 9:57 as Nic Dowd had a good look in front of the net after a nice set up by Erik Gustafsson. Trevor van Riemsdyk had the secondary assist.

The Caps would then take their first lead of the season off a rip from Marcus Johansson at the right face off circle. T.J. Oshie and Lars Eller had the assists.

The Caps took a 2-1 lead into the first intermission as new backup goalie Charlie Lindgren made 20 saves off 21 shots. The Caps put up 11 shots.

Calle Jarnkrok tied the game at two at 3:53. 2-2 was the score after two with shots even in the second period at nine apiece.

The Caps were outshot in the third period 9-6 and 39-26 overall. The most important and according to Samsonov “harder shot” came from Matthews himself at 6:55.

The Caps not only failed to get the equalizer, they were also 0 for 5 on the power play including on two chances late in the game. They were 0 for 4 the night before. How does Blaine Forsythe still have a job? I don’t know.

Samsonov finished the night with 24 saves. Lindgren meanwhile had 36 saves. Samsonov met with Ovechkin and Evgeny Kuznetsov after the game and judging by the picture it looked like Ovechkin was mad.

Johansson said this after the game:

“We gave ourselves the chance to win. It’s one of the top teams in the league, but we didn’t execute in the end and it’s tough to swallow.”

The Caps look to bounce back on Saturday night at home against the Montreal Canadiens in a must win game.