A night removed from handing the Detroit Red Wings defeat in the comfy confines of Capital One Arena, the Washington Capitals were returned the favor at Little Caesars Arena, 5-2, in their first road date of exhibition play. The loss marked Washington’s first in regulation in the preseason, dropping its record to 1-1-1.
The traveling party consisted of several starters from last season, including Dylan Strome (1g, 1a), Sonny Milano (19:06 TOI) and Trevor van Riemsdyk (3 shots), while opening night hopefuls such as Beck Malenstyn (3 hits), Hardy Häman Aktell (20:33 TOI) and Joe Snively (1 shot) continued their push for a permanent spot in the lineup.
Similar in beats to the club’s preseason opener that saw them afoul of three first-period penalties, the Capitals found themselves in the box twice within the opening 12 minutes of tonight’s contest. Unlike their exhibition opener though, they could not hold the opposition off the scorecard ceding a power-play goal at 13:12 to double their deficit after Austin Czarnik opened the scoring seven minutes into the game.
The penalty woes continued into the second period, as an early power-play opportunity was quickly extinguished by a boarding minor from Ethen Frank 40 seconds into the middle frame. A Martin Fehervary interference penalty not even a minute later put the Wings back on the power play and the home team wasted no time adding another tally to their lead via a Dylan Larkin wrister at 2:46.
Washington responded in kind thanks to a power-play tally from Strome at 8:47. The 26-year-old center entered the offensive zone with speed, receiving a quality setup from Frank on the fly to snap a quick shot past the glove of goaltender Michael Hutchinson just above the left-circle in the offensive zone.
Despite allowing a fourth goal a couple minutes after, Washington had the makings of a comeback brewing following a beautiful tic-tac-toe effort between Milano, Strome and Matthew Phillips resulting in a goal for the latter at 15:00.
The Capitals were quickly put on the power play 59 seconds later with the Wings guilty of putting too many dudes on the ice at once. Unfortunately for the away side though, they were only able to muster one shot and saw the deficit remain at two heading into the break.
Detroit sealed the result with its captain picking up his second of the night early in the third period to make the score 5-2, which would hold for the remainder of regulation in Motown.
Washington continues a stretch of three straight on the road in exhibition play, next traveling to Boston to take on the Bruins at TD Garden on Tuesday, Oct. 3 at 7 p.m. ET.
