POSTGAME NOTEBOOK: Isles 1, Caps 0

Blank - The Caps concluded a five-game road trip on Tuesday night on Long Island, facing the New York Islanders at NYCB Live five nights after absorbing an 8-4 loss to the Isles at the same venue. The two rivals went at again in a vastly different contest, and the Caps came out on the short end of a 1-0 decision.

"In the first, I think the edge probably went to them," says Caps coach Peter Laviolette. "I liked the way we played in the second period; it seemed like we climbed back in it a little bit. It was tight, not a lot of room.
"And then in the third period they had a few chances early on in the first three or four minutes and got five or six shots on net, and some of them were real good looks. And then I thought they had another five or six towards the end of the period when we were pressing. They caught us off the rush a couple times as we were trying to get back into it with six minutes to go in the game."
New York's Brock Nelson scored the lone goal of the game, tucking home a rebound of a Ryan Pulock point shot at 13:05 of the third period. Time and space were at a premium for much of the night in the offensive zone, and both goaltenders were excellent in what was mostly a tight-checking, defensive dominant game.
"It was obviously indicative of the score," says Caps winger Conor Sheary. "There wasn't much space out there. There were definitely scoring chances that were Grade A's, and our goalie and their goalie both made some big saves. But overall, it was tight-checking and it felt like a little bit of a playoff atmosphere."
Washington started slow out of the gates; the Caps weren't able to get many pucks to the net in the first 15 minutes or so, and they needed Vitek Vanecek to make a couple of key stops for them.
"I thought we got off to a slow start," says Caps defenseman Justin Schultz. "It wasn't a good first 20 [minutes] for us, and I thought we got better as the game went on. We had our chances; it just wouldn't go in for us tonight. Vitek made some huge saves for us at the other end to keep us in it, too."

New York becomes the first team to blank the Capitals this season. Owners of the best home ice record (16-1-2) in the NHL this season, the Isles also allow the fewest goals at home of any team (2.00 per game) and they score the second-most goals at home (3.79 per game). Before the Caps limited them to Nelson's goal on Tuesday, New York was tops in the league in home goals.
Washington entered Tuesday night's contest as one of only two teams in the League that had yet to suffer a shutout setback; the other is the Ottawa Senators.
Save Me -Vanecek absorbed Tuesday night's hard luck loss to the Islanders despite making 38 saves in the game. It's the third time this season he has made as many as 38 stops in a game and he is now 1-1-1 in such games. In his last two starts, Vanecek has stopped 60 of the 62 shots he has faced for a .968 save pct.
Tuesday's game marked the third straight in which Washington got a stellar effort from its goaltender, and the second straight in which a Caps goalie faced 39 shots; Ilya Samsonov stopped 35 of 39 in Sunday's 5-4 win over the Devils in New Jersey.
"Yeah, it's been awesome," says Sheary of the Caps' goaltending. "Last game in Jersey, Sammy was great. He made a couple huge saves to keep us in that game, and then obviously tonight they had some good looks, they had some mini breakaways, 2-on-1s, and Vitek was able to make some big saves for us."

Killing It - With a 2-for-2 night on the penalty kill in Tuesday's loss, the Capitals have successfully snuffed out each of their last 12 penalty killing missions, dating back to March 30. With an 87.2 percent success rate on the kill since March 1, the Caps rank second in the NHL over that span. On the season, the Caps' kill rate of 82.9 percent ranks seventh in the circuit.
Tough Loss - Tuesday's loss marks the first time this season that the Caps have held an opponent to two or fewer goals in a game without getting two points. Washington is now 14-1-0 when it limits the opposition to two or fewer tallies in a game.
The Capitals also suffered their first regulation loss in a one-goal game this season on Tuesday night, falling to 14-1-4 on the season in such contests.
Biting The Hand - Varlamov's shutout was his fourth of the season and the 31st of his NHL career. It was his first in 16 career appearances against Washington, the team that drafted him in the first round (23rd overall) of the 2006 NHL Draft.
Varlamov's whitewash of Washington is the first shutout of the Capitals by an ex-Caps goalie since Jaroslav Halak spun a 3-0 shutout of the Caps on Dec. 1, 2016 in the District, in a game that also marked the NHL debut of Washington winger Jakub Vrana. Halak was also a member of the Islanders at that time.
Tuesday's shutout was the first 1-0 shutout suffered by the Caps since Feb. 3, 2019 when Boston's Tuukka Rask blanked the Caps in Washington, and it's the first time the Caps have been blanked by a 1-0 count on the road since Detroit's Petr Mrazek turned the trick on Nov. 10, 2015.
By The Numbers -John Carlson led the Caps with 25:22 in ice time … Sheary, Zdeno Chara and Tom Wilson had four shots on net each to lead the Caps … Alex Ovechkin led the Caps with seven shot attempts … Ovechkin, Brenden Dillon and Garnet Hathaway led Washington with four hits each … Carlson, Wilson and Dmitry Orlov eacvh had two blocked shots to pace the Caps … Lars Eller won eight of a dozen draws (67 percent) in Tuesday's game.