Caps Reach End of Road in Florida
Caps play final regular season road game on Monday night in Sunrise, seeking their 25th road win
By
Mike Vogel
WashingtonCaps.com
Washington reaches the end of its 41-game regular season road schedule on Monday night in Sunrise, Fla., where it will take on the Florida Panthers in its lone visit to the east coast of the Sunshine State this season. The Caps will finish up the 2018-19 regular season with home games on Thursday and Saturday against Montreal and the New York Islanders, respectively.
The Caps are coming in hot, winners of their last four straight games. After starting their final road trip of the season by clinching a playoff berth with a 3-2 win over Carolina on Thursday, the Caps went to Tampa Bay and took a 6-3 decision from the Presidents' Trophy-winning Lightning on Saturday.
Nicklas Backstrom, T.J. Oshie and Alex Ovechkin each scored a pair of goals in the win over the Bolts, and each reached a milestone in doing so. Most notably, Ovechkin reached the 50-goal plateau for the eighth time in his NHL career. Only Hockey Hall of Famers Wayne Gretzky and Mike Bossy (nine each) have had more 50-goal seasons. Ovechkin finished the 2017-18 season with 49 goals.
Backstrom notched his 20th goal, reaching that level for the fourth straight season and the sixth time in his NHL career. Oshie reached 25 goals for the third time in his career and the third time in his four seasons with the Capitals.
For the Caps, the two points were of importance. The win enabled them to maintain their three-point lead over the Islanders in the Metro Division while shaving another game off the schedule. An especially strong start keyed the Caps' victory; Washington limited the Lightning to just five shots on net in the first period, four of them clustered in a span of two minutes in the middle of the period, and none of them from a top six Tampa Bay forward.
"I think we wanted to be better," says Caps right wing Tom Wilson. "Obviously they had our number a bit so far this year and we just wanted to keep getting better every time we played them.
"This was a pretty good team effort, a pretty good 60 minutes, and guys sticking together, guys playing the right way. There is a good feeling in here for sure, and that's what you want at this time of the year going into such an important time, just playing the right way and playing together. Like I said, that had a playoff feel out there tonight, and both teams don't like losing."
Washington took a 3-0 lead to its room at first intermission and maintained its multi-goal cushion for the final 49 minutes of the game.
"I think we set the tone right away, we sent the message right away," says Ovechkin. "All four lines played outstanding. Obviously we know they have a pretty good team, they have an experienced team, and we have to send a message right away. We knew it wasn't going to be easy with four games left, and I know they won the Presidents' Trophy. But again, we just wanted to send a message and play the right way."
Message sent, as were 26 shots on net and 43 shot attempts from Ovechkin in the three games between the Capitals and the Lightning this season. The high shot volume produced a pair of two-goal games against the Bolts, giving him 47 goals in 69 career contests against Tampa Bay.
Washington is aiming for its 25th road win of the season; the Caps have reached that level only once previously in their history, when they won 27 road games in 2015-16. The Caps will be facing Florida for the final time this season, and they're still seeking their first win over the Cats in 2018-19. The Panthers prevailed 6-5 in a wild one in Washington on Oct. 19, a game in which each team struck twice on the power play. The Capitals dug themselves out of a 4-1 ditch to scrape a point out of that contest.
In the most recent meeting between the two former Southeast Division rivals, Florida took a 5-4 overtime win on Mike Hoffman's power-play goal in the extra session. Washington rallied from a trio of two-goal deficits to collect a point that night.
Florida just missed a playoff berth last season, finishing with 96 points. The Panthers have regressed to 82 points thus far this season, largely due to a porous defense and leaky goaltending. Florida's average of 3.23 goals per game ranks ninth in the league, but the team has permitted 3.35 goals against per night. Among the 31 teams, only Ottawa (3.64) and Chicago (3.56) are worse.
The Panthers' power play unit ranks second in the NHL at 27.1 percent this season, and three of the 10 goals they've scored against Washington this season have come with the man advantage.
