Sun. March 18 Washington Capitals @ Philadelphia Flyers
Place: Wells Fargo Center
Time: 5:00 p.m.
TV: NBCSWA
Radio: 106.7 The Fan, Capitals Radio 24/7
NHL.COM
Philadelphia Flyers 83-36-25-11 Last Game: Mar 17 Won 4-2 against Hurricanes
Washington Capitals 89-41-23-7 Last Game: Mar 16 Won 6-3 against Islanders
8-Ovechkin 72-Boyd 43-Wilson
65-Burakovsky 19-Bäckström 77-Oshie
13-Vrana 20-Eller 39-Chiasson
18-Stephenson 83-Beagle 25-Smith-Pelly
29-Djoos 74-Carlson
9-Orlov 2-Niskanen
6-Kempny 28-Jerabek
31-Grubauer (starter)
70-Holtby
-- SCRATCH --
92-Kuznetsov (day-to-day, upper-body injury)
72-Boyd
22-Bowey
44-Orpik (day-to-day, lower-body injury)
-- INJURED RESERVE --
-- 1st Powerplay Unit --
77-Oshie 19-Bäckström 43-Wilson ??
8-Ovechkin 74-Carlson
-- 2nd Powerplay Unit --
13-Vrana 20-Eller 65-Burakovsky
2-Niskanen 9-Orlov
Referees: Wes McCauley (#4) Tom Kowal (#32)
Linesmen: Ryan Gibbons (#58), Kiel Murchison (#79)
1st PeriodNone
2nd Period02:15 Flyers GOAL Gostisbehere 1-0 PHI
15:08 GOAL 8-Ovechkin, assists 72-Boyd & 74-Carlson 1-1 TIE
18:19 Flyers GOAL Lindblom 2-1 PHI
19:41 Flyers GOAL Provorov 3-1 PHI
3rd Period01:37 Flyers GOAL Simmonds 4-1 PHI
10:31 GOAL 18-Stephenson, assist 13-Vrana 4-2 PHI
14:27 Flyers GOAL Simmonds 5-2 PHI
16:07 GOAL 74-Carlson, assists 8-Ovechkin & 19-Bäckström 5-3 PHI
19:22 Flyers GOAL Voracek 6-3 PHI
FINAL: 6-3 PHI
By Isabelle Khurshudyan March 17 at 5:14 PM
Capitals are getting goals from players not named Alex Ovechkin
Washington Capitals left wing Alex Ovechkin assists as right wing T.J. Oshie scores on New York Islanders goaltender Jaroslav Halak in the first period Friday. (Alex Brandon/Associated Press)As the Washington Capitals put on a goal-scoring clinic in back-to-back wins Thursday and Friday against the New York Islanders, nine players combined for 13 goals. Alex Ovechkin, remarkably, didn’t score any of them, and that might have been the most encouraging part for the Capitals.
Ovechkin’s NHL-leading 42 goals have been a lifeline for Washington as the team has weathered lengthy slumps by its other top forwards. Ovechkin’s production has been a constant, accounting for nearly 20 percent of the Capitals’ goal output. But with the playoffs just 11 games away, Washington is riding a four-game winning streak entering its key Metropolitan Division matchup at the Philadelphia Flyers on Sunday, and more importantly, the Capitals may be rediscovering the balanced scoring they boasted a season ago.
“I don’t think anyone in here is worried about [Ovechkin] not scoring,” forward T.J. Oshie said. “But it is good that we have other guys stepping up and other guys feeling the puck and other guys getting rewarded for their hard work. That’s important. We want confidence throughout the lineup offensively going into the postseason here, so that’s something that hopefully we can get on a more consistent basis.”
After 19 games without a goal, Oshie has three in his past two games. Rookie Jakub Vrana went 25 games over more than two months without a goal and was even a healthy scratch for a handful of games, but he has three goals and two assists in the past seven games. After Andre Burakovsky had a miserable start to the season, suffering a broken thumb just nine games in, he has seemingly found his scoring touch with five goals in his past 16 games. Washington also got goals from three defensemen — John Carlson, Matt Niskanen and Dmitry Orlov — over the past two games.
Expectations should be tempered — the Islanders are the league’s worst defensive team — but a more even distribution of goals was a fixture of the Capitals’ success last season. And even with the off season departures of top-six forwards Marcus Johansson and Justin Williams, the team was never expected to be as top-heavy as it has been. Ovechkin has twice as many goals as the team’s next leading goal scorer, Evgeny Kuznetsov. In a potential blow for Washington, Kuznetsov suffered an undisclosed upper-body injury late in the second period Friday, when he was slashed and then collided awkwardly with the boards, crunching his left arm. Coach Barry Trotz didn’t have an update on the severity of the injury after the game.
If Kuznetsov, (21 goals, 50 assists) has to miss any length of time, production from players not named Ovechkin becomes even more important. The Capitals have just a two-point lead on the Pittsburgh Penguins for first place in the division.
“For the most part this year, we’ve had some guys go on long dry spells, and Ovi’s been the consistency to our equation of winning hockey games,” Trotz said. “We’re going to score on the power play, or Ovi’s going to score or a chip in from someone else. But there’s been some dry spells, and right now everybody’s sort of getting on the mark here.”
Some lineup tweaks by Trotz seemed to trigger the offensive outbursts. Before Thursday’s game in New York, Trotz reunited Oshie and Burakovsky with center Nicklas Bäckström, a trio that hasn’t played much together this season but enjoyed success in the second round of the playoffs a year ago. In the small sample size of the past two games, that line has scored two five-on-five goals, and the Capitals have taken 60 percent of the shot attempts when those three have been on the ice together, according to Natural Stat Trick.
In the second game of the back-to-back set, Trotz made a few lineup substitutions because he felt some players had “fallen off a little bit” and he wanted to “create some competition within the group.” Depth forward Alex Chiasson had been a healthy scratch for six of the past seven games, and Trotz played him over forward Brett Connolly on the Capitals’ third line with center Lars Eller. Chiasson assured himself at least one more game in the lineup with a three-point performance, including his first goal since Jan. 2.
“Made a statement not only to me but to everybody else that ‘I want to stay in the lineup,’ ” Trotz said.
“Maybe with two or three minutes left in the third, I kind of sat there and gave myself a tap on the back for the hard work and keeping the positivity,” Chiasson said. “This time of the year, for a guy who’s been in and out of the lineup lately, to come up with a performance like that, I’ll be ready to go next game.”
