Missing their number one netminder and half of their nominal defense corps, the Capitals went into UBS Arena on Saturday night and handed the New York Islanders their fourth straight defeat, a 4-1 setback. Making his second ever NHL start, Hunter Shepard earned his second win with a stellar 36-save performance to earn first star honors.
The Caps supported Shepard with a gritty, gutty road effort, combining to block 32 shots in front of him. Three of Washington’s four forward lines contributed to the attack, with Alex Ovechkin striking twice to climb to 826 career goals. Ovechkin’s two goals – the second of which was an empty-netter in the final seconds – sandwiched a pair of late second-period strikes from Nic Dowd and Aliaksei Protas, respectively.
“It was a character win,” proclaims Caps’ coach Spencer Carbery. “Difficult circumstances with the back-to-backs, on the road, and losing a few bodies mid-trip. For us to find a way – it wasn’t pretty at times – and we had to defend quite a bit. But we found a way.”
Shepard was subbing in for Darcy Kuemper, who “got a little bit nicked up,” in Wednesday’s overtime loss to Florida. The set of regulation wins in road games on back-to-back nights are Washington’s first in almost exactly two years, since Nov. 11-12, 2021, in Detroit and Columbus, respectively. The Caps are now 6-1-1 in their last eight games, and they head home for the next four, starting Tuesday night against defending Stanley Cup champs Vegas.
Washington continued its recent trend of scoring first on Saturday, getting out to a 1-0 lead immediately out of the first television timeout of the first frame. Evgeny Kuznetsov cleanly won a left dot draw in New York ice, pulling it back to Ovechkin in the pocket. The Caps’ captain found a lane and fired, beating Isles’ goalie Semyon Varlamov to the glove side at 9:18 of the first, a mere two seconds after the face-off.
“Me and Kuzy talked about it right before the face-off,” recounts Ovechkin. “Kuzy tell me what to do, and it works. I have to listen more to Kuzy.”
To that point of the first, the Caps’ patchwork defense held their own. But as the period wore on, the Isles began to spend more time in Washington ice, peppering Shepard with shots. He was the equal of everything sent his way until a miscommunication in the final minute of the frame cost him and the Caps, resulting in a gift goal for the Isles.
Shepard went behind his net to handle the puck after a Bo Horvat dump-in. He tried to send it to Nick Jensen, but the pass was in Jensen’s skates. Compounding the sudden crisis, Jensen lost his footing and dropped to the ice, enabling New York’s Mat Barzal to get to the puck below the goal line and thread it to the high slot for Alexander Romanov, who did not miss the empty net. Romanov’s first goal of the season tied the game at 1-1 with just 42.5 seconds left in the period.
The Islanders were credited with 30 shot attempts in the first, and 21 of those came in the back half of the period.
The Caps killed off a New York power play to start the second, and then successfully fended off the Isles’ bids to take the lead. Shepard made an excellent stop on Horvat early in the second, showing good anticipation and moving laterally to his left to keep the game even.
Washington’s own second-period power play also went by the wayside without a lamp lighter, and the game remained even into the back half of the middle frame. That’s when the opportunistic Caps struck for a pair of tallies from their bottom six.
Dowd batted a loose puck home from the top of the paint at 13:05 of the second, after linemate Nicolas Aube-Kubel tried to do the same with a big rebound of a John Carlson one-timer. Dowd’s first goal of the season restored the Caps’ one-goal lead at 2-1.
In the final minute of the frame, the Caps netted another, essentially nullifying New York’s own last-minute tally in the first. Connor McMichael carried into the Isles’ end on a 3-on-2, but an attempt at a net front deflection didn’t click. Not to worry, kid. Matthew Phillips collected it behind the net and found Protas lurking in the slot, unmarked, perhaps the most time and space any white-sweatered player had in that area of the ice to that point of the game. Protas buried his first of the season with 39.9 seconds left in the middle period, enabling the Caps to carry a two-goal advantage into the third.
Washington dressed a trio of young defensemen who’ve spent most of the season to this point splitting one role among the three of them, that of the left-handed rearguard on the third pair. None of the three shone brightly enough to seize the role for himself over the early portion of the season, and then the Caps lost Trevor van Riemsdyk to a lower body injury last weekend, and Martin Fehervary to a lower body ailment in Friday’s road win in New Jersey. So for the first time ever, all three of Alex Alexeyev, Hardy Häman Aktell and Lucas Johansen were in the lineup together on Saturday against the Isles.
Playing consecutive games for the first time in his NHL career, it was Johansen who separated himself from the pack, finishing the night with a single-game career high of 20:11 in ice time and a team high five blocked shots. Johansen logged 8:17 in the third period alone – more than Alexeyev and Häman Aktell combined – and he was on the ice for a large chunk of the 5-on-6 play late in the third.
“I thought he did a good job,” says Carbery. “What’s on display with him is he can really skate, and so when you’re defending and you’re in the defensive zone, his ability to close and go stick on puck and shut plays down is on display. I thought he separated himself in that respect.”
Shepard stopped all 16 shots he faced in the third period, making perhaps his best save of the night to deny Kyle Palmieri all alone at the top of the paint with just under six minutes remaining.
“He was great,” says Carbery of Shepard. “Their shot attempts are probably through the roof. I’m assuming they’re close to 80, 90 shot attempts. And for him, seeing through traffic, tons of bodies, rebounds, and stuff around the net; they started to try to use behind the net and stuffs, and he was exceptional tonight.”
The number Carbery was looking for was 98; that’s how many shots the Isles teed up. Fourteen of Washington’s 18 skaters recorded at least one – led by Johansen and Beck Malenstyn with five each – and they combined to block 32 shots in front of Shepard.
“They just battled,” says Shepard of his teammates. “You saw guys selling out and blocking shots. And they get stuck out there sometimes, if I make a bad play behind the net, and we get stuck on our zone for a minute and a half. You don’t feel guilty, but it’s different when you want to do it for somebody else. It’s amazing how I felt when you’re so tired; the body just kind of takes over. So yeah, the guys were awesome tonight.”
And so was Shepard.
