Caps Lose Late, 3-2

Sunday afternoon's game between the Caps and the Columbus Blue Jackets was an extremely forgettable affair until the final 100 seconds. That's when the Caps believe events conspired to take at least a point out of their pockets.

Blue Jackets captain Nick Foligno feigned his way into drawing a hi-sticking call on Caps center Nicklas Backstrom with 1:34 remaining in a 2-2 game. With Foligno curling out of the corner with the puck, Backstrom went to lift the Columbus captain's stick. Backstrom's stick came up high to be sure, but two different replay angles showed no contact whatsoever between blade and visage.

"I didn't touch him," says Backstrom. "It was really weird that I got a penalty there. In the last two minutes, if you get a penalty that's not a penalty, that's tough."

The lack of contact didn't prevent Foligno from snapping his head back as if he'd been shot.

The call was sold, the call was made, and Backstrom was sent to the box.

You know the rest of the story.

Alexander Wennberg finished off a pretty tic-tac-toe passing play from Foligno on the ensuing power play to put the Jackets on top with less than a minute left, and the Caps suffered a 3-2 loss to the Jackets.

"I hope the league looks at that," says Caps coach Barry Trotz. "If you look at it, that's not - you can see on the replay he doesn't really touch him, and [Foligno's] head pops up when Backy's stick is already on the way down.

"That's just a little bit disrespectful to the game. The league will look at that, and they have fines for that, so I'm sure that will be something that they took advantage of. I wouldn't be too happy about [it] as a referee.

"[The Jackets] capitalized. We had to kill that penalty off."

The rest of the game was mostly a snooze fest, and the goals were mostly scored on breaks and bounces.

Washington got on the board first, taking a 1-0 lead on Backstrom's fifth goal of the season at 3:11 of the first frame. Backstrom appeared to be trying to thread a pass from the left half wall to Marcus Johansson, who was driving by the slot. Instead, the puck clicked off Jackets' defenseman Jack Johnson's stick and slipped behind Columbus netminder Sergei Bobrovsky.

Columbus got the game's first power play early in the second, and the Jackets needed just 13 seconds with which to tie the game. From down low on the right side, Foligno tried to thread a cross-crease feed for Cam Atkinson, who was parked at the back door. But the puck hit John Carlson's skate and bounced behind Braden Holtby to make it a 1-1 game at 6:07 of the second.

The Jackets seemed to draw some momentum from that goal and they quickly drew another power play just 68 seconds after the Foligno goal. The Caps killed off three-quarters of that call before Columbus forward Brandon Saad was sent off for an interference infraction, nullifying the rest of that power play and giving the Caps an abbreviated man advantage opportunity of their own.

Sixteen seconds before Saad was to be sprung, the Caps regained the lead with a power-play goal of their own.

Backstrom was able to force a pass through a seam to Alex Ovechkin, who pumped a shot home from the bottom of the left circle to make it a 2-1 game at 10:31 of the middle stanza. Backstrom's pass wasn't perfect; it hit an enemy stick en route to Ovechkin, and the Caps captain did a great job of settling and firing before Bobrovsky could react.

Washington nursed that 2-1 lead into the third, but it didn't last long. The Jackets tied it up just 14 seconds into the third, winning a corner battle and getting the puck to the front where Brandon Dubinsky put a strong deke on Holtby and tucked the puck behind him to make it 2-2.

Scoring chances were few and far between for both sides for most of the afternoon, as two teams with powerful offensive attacks slogged their way through a tight-checking, defensive contest. The two teams combined for 21 shots on net in the first frame and just 23 the rest of the way.

The second period was particularly bereft of action, aside from the two power-play markers. Columbus and Washington combined for a grand total of five even-strength shots on net in the second period. Five.

After Ovechkin's goal midway through the second, the two sides skated more than seven and a half straight minutes without either side generating a shot on net. When Dubinsky scored early in the third, he did so on the Blue Jackets' first shot on net in a span of 12 minutes and 21 seconds.

"I think both sides," says Trotz, "if you look at the chances in the second period, after two periods there wasn't a lot on either side. There was a muddy track right in the middle of the ice for both teams."

Foligno earned the primary assist on Wennberg's game-winner, executing the same cross-crease pass he was trying to make when he tied the game in the second period. For the second time in less than a week, the Caps lost a game in which they held a one-goal lead heading into the third period against the Blue Jackets.

"It was kind of the same game in Columbus," says Backstrom, referring to Washington's 2-1 overtime loss there on Tuesday night. "We were up a goal and then they came back. Thy got some lucky bounces and got back and won. I think we should have at least gotten one point out of this."
Point Blanked - With less then two minutes left in Sunday's matinee match between the Capitals and the Columbus Blue Jackets at Verizon Center, it certainly appeared as though the two teams would be headed to overtime for the second time in less than a week.

But with the score tied at 2-2, the game took a sudden turn with 1:34 remaining. Caps center Nicklas Backstrom was sent to the penalty box for a phantom hi-sticking call on Jackets captain Nick Foligno, putting the league's top power play unit on the ice. Backstrom's stick came up, but two different replay angles showed no contact with the blade of the stick and Foligno's face.

Foligno helped sell the call, the referee bought it, and Columbus scored on the ensuing power play to win in regulation, picking a point out of the Caps' pocket. Foligno set up the game-winning goal with a perfect pass to Alexander Wennberg, giving the Jackets their fourth win in a row and further tightening the Metropolitan Division standings.

According to Elias Sports Bureau, Wennberg's game-winner marks just the fifth time in the Blue Jackets' 16-year history that a Columbus player has scored the go-ahead goal in the final minute of regulation. Wennberg joins David Vyborny (2002), Rick Nash (2008), Vinny Prospal (2013) and Mark Letestu (2014) on that short list.

The abrupt and stinging loss likely deprived the Caps of at least a standings point (and a chance at another) against a divisional rival, which could be important as the season wears on.

Using points percentage as a basis of measurement, four of the NHL's top six teams and five of the league's top eight clubs currently reside in the Metropolitan Division. Five points separate the top four teams and six points separate the top five clubs.

When games in hand are taken into account, things get even tighter. The Jackets have played just 16 games thus far, the fewest of any team in the league. They have three games in hand on the front-running New York Rangers, and if Columbus were to win those three games in hand, they'd be a point ahead of the Blueshirts.

Hot Hand -Backstrom scored Washington's first goal of the game on Sunday, a first-period tally that was actually intended as a pass to Marcus Johansson. The puck took a fortuitous Washington bounce, clicking off Columbus defenseman Jack Johnson and going behind Jackets goalie Sergei Bobrovsky.

Later in the game, Backstrom collected an assist on Washington's second goal of the contest. On Monday, the NHL announced Backstrom as the league's third star for the week ending Nov 20. He had four goals and four assists in four games, racking up a remarkable eight points during a stretch in which the Capitals scored a total of 11 goals.

Backstrom now has four multiple-point games this season and 180 over the course of his NHL career.

Five On Four -Alex Ovechkin netted the 198th power-play goal of his NHL career midway through the second period, a goal that gave the Caps the 2-1 lead they took into the third period of Sunday's game against Columbus.

Ovechkin's power-play goal was the Caps' first five-on-four power-play goal since Oct. 30 when Marcus Johansson scored with the extra man against the Flames in Calgary. With just five five-on-four goals this season, the Caps are tied with Ottawa for last in the league in that category.

Shots Not Fired -Through Sunday's NHL activity, the Blue Jackets rank in the bottom third of the league with an average of 31.5 shots on goal against per game. Two games against Washington this week helped Columbus actually improve upon that figure.

The Jackets limited the Capitals to a mere 22 shots on net in Tuesday night's 2-1 overtime win over Washington in Columbus, and they held the Caps to just 23 shots on net in Sunday's game at Verizon Center.

After hovering in or around the top five for most of the season, the Caps have dipped to 12th in the NHL with an average of 30.2 shots on goal per game.

Solid Start - Caps winger Paul Carey made his Washington debut for 2016-17 on Sunday, skating 12:08 in the loss to the Blue Jackets. Carey, 28, was recalled from AHL Hershey on Saturday after Washington lost forwards Lars Eller (day-to-day) and T.J. Oshie (week-to-week) to upper body injuries in Friday's win over the Red Wings.

"I thought Paul was really good," says Caps coach Barry Trotz. "He go on the puck, he made a play - we had that long shift with [Zach Sanford's] line there - and he outraced a guy on an icing call, which allowed us to get some fresh people on. You don't know how big that is when you've got a group out there that has been on [the ice] for a shift and a half."

Carey was credited with a shot on net, a couple of hits and a blocked shot in Sunday's game. Although he was returned to AHL Hershey on Monday, he could be recalled again on Wednesday when Washington hosts St. Louis if Eller is still found to be ailing at that point.

Down On The Farm - The ECHL South Carolina Stingrays earned a 5-2 win over the Colorado Eagles on Sunday at North Charleston Coliseum.

Five different Stingrays found the back of the net to support the goaltending efforts of Parker Milner, who needed to make only a dozen saves to improve his record to 5-3-1 on the season. Rob Flick (one goal, two assists) and Steve Weinstein (three assists) each had three-point games for South Carolina.

The 6-7-1 Stingrays are now idle until Saturday when they host the Norfolk Admirals.

By The Numbers - Matt Niskanen led the Capitals with 23:13 in ice time … Ovechkin led Washington with five shots on net and nine shot attempts … Tom Wilson led the Caps with four hits … Karl Alzner led the Capitals with four blocked shots … Backstrom won eight of 12 (67%) face-offs.