POSTGAME 5: Capitals Punish Flyers, 9-2
The Washington Capitals crushed the Philadelphia Flyers by a 9-2 count at Capital One Arena on Tuesday night.
By
Bill Meltzer
philadelphiaflyers.com
The Capitals jumped out to a 2-0 lead on goals by Alex Ovechkin (46th of the season) and T.J. Oshie (9th). After the Flyers quickly responded with a James van Riemsdyk breakaway goal on a delayed penalty (19th), Martin Fehervary (8th) restored a two-goal margin.
Lars Eller (11th) scored a goal on a transition rush to build a 4-1 lead for the Capitals early in the second period. Matt Irwin (1st) made it 5-1. Conor Sheary (17th) extended the lead to 6-1 with an all-too-easy tally at 15:30.
Matt Irwin built a 6-1 lead on a point shot with traffic in front at 3:31 of the third period. Eller scored his second of the game (12th of the season) on a counterattacking goal at 5:59 as he found open ice over the middle. A Garnet Hathaway tally (12th) turned the cavernous Washington edge to 8-1. The Flyers got a carom off van Riemsdyk's skate for a power play goal (2nd goal of the game, 20th of the season) on a 4-on-3 power play but Johan Larsson (7th) got ir right back on a 5-on-4 power play.
Carter Hart appeared to labor over the course of the first period. He left with a lower-body injury after giving up three goals on 10 shots. Martin Jones went the rest of the way. He faced 27 shots, stopping 21 and giving up six goals.
Ilya Samsonov stopped 18 of 20 shots to earn the win for Washington. He was hardly tested over long stretches of the game.
The Flyers went 1-for-3 on the power play. The Capitals went 1-for-4.
Bobby Brink made his NHL debut in this game. He skated 14:27 of ice time, recording two shots on goal and getting his first NHL assist.
TURNING POINT
The Capitals were the better team pretty much from the outset of the game. The Ovechkin rebound bank-shot off Hart and into the net for the first goal of the game at 6:01 of the opening period set an ominous tone for how the game was going to go.
Early on, the Flyers were at least competing for pucks, although they were making bad decisions -- often under pressure, sometimes unforced-- in the dangerous areas high in the offensive zone. As the game progressed, the Flyers' competitiveness level dropped.
MELTZER'S TAKE
1) Morgan Frost fired a shot from the right hash marks wide of the net at 4:09 of the first period. Hart made a stop on Marcus Johansson on a wraparound attempt.
Cam Atkinson turned over an attempted pass to Kevin Hayes, and the Capitals attacked in transition. Hart stopped a skittering shot from Ovechkin off a Conor Sheary pass but then banked his own rebound off Hart and into the net at 6:01. Evgeny Kuznetsov got the secondary assist.
At one of the ice, Jones denied a short-side attempt by Bäckström. At the other, Laughton ran out of gas on a late-shift stretch pass from Owen Tippett and was unable to get the puck.
Matt Irwin hit the post through traffic a couple shifts later.
The Capitals fourth line hemmed the Flyers in and generated an offensive zone faceoff with 9:00 left. On the next shift, Washington scored. Oshie had a tap-in at the post off a setup by Carlson. The secondary assist went to Nicklas Bäckström.
Thirty six seconds later,after a Justin Schultz shot went off teammate Lars Eller, van Riemsyk went off on a partial breakaway. Fouled for a delayed penalty, JVR slid a backhander between Samsonov's pads to cut the gap to 2-1. The goal was unassisted.
At 13:16, the Capitals carved up the Flyers' coverage and made it 3-1. Fehervary turned Ronnie Attard and then maneuvered around Hart to score. Nic Dowd and Garnet Hathaway were credited with the qassists.
The Capitals went on the game's first power play at 14:00. Rasmus Ristolainen was called for hooking, Cam York blocked a pair of shots. Hart scrambled for a save on Carlson through traffic. The Flyers, with Hart laboring in the net, got through the kill.
Hart denied another attempted wraparound and the Flyers survived a scramble near the net.
The Flyes went on their first power play at 17:45. Tom Wilson went to the box for a hit from behind on Atkinson with the Flyers down on one knee facing the boards. Wilson received a two-minute penalty. The Flyers generated no chances of note beyond a shot from Hayes in the mid center slot. Frost had a bad giveaway to Kuznetsov with the second unit on the ice.
Atkinson went up the tunnel after the hit by Wilson. Hart continued to flex his leg when the puck was at the other end.
2) First period shots on goal were 10-8 in Washington's favor (attempts were 20-18 Caps). Scoring chances were 9-9 overall but high-danger chances were 6-3 in Washington's favor. The Caps won 11 of 19 faceoffs.
3) Martin Jones came in to start the second period. Atkinson did not return for the second period, and also had to leave the game with a lower-body injury.
A Ristolainen pass intended for Scott Laughton was instead turned over to Fehervary in the slot. Sanheim erased it.
About six minutes in the middle stanza, Hayes muscled the puck to the net on a wraparound attempt. Provorov then had Hayes open on the back door but couldn't get the puck to him. The shift ended with Washington scoring in transition Mantha passed to Eller in the left slot and the Danish veteran scored. Wilson received the secondary assist at 6:39.
The Capitals' Sheary had a massive amount of time and space with no Flyers near him -- including both defensemen Ivan Provorov and Ronnie Attard caught up high in the defense zone and all three forwards above the dots -- to deke and stickhandle and then beat Jones from point blank range at 15:30. The assists went to Kuznetsov and Ovechkin.
Konecny had a late second-period scoring chance and then Noah Cates took the puck away from a Cap attempting to exit the zone.With two seconds left in the period, Cam York took a pass from Frost and fired a shot that narrowly missed high to the short side.
4) The Flyers were lucky to get out of the second period down "only" by four goals. They were poor on both sides of the puck, getting smothered or settling for low-percentage one-and-done forays. Defensively, the Flyers were not nearly competitive enough. Ditto 50-50 puck situations. Shots on goal were 14-8 Capitals (attempts 20-14 Capitals). Scoring chances were 13-5 Caps (5-3 in high-danger chances).
5) The Capitals controlled the puck for the first three-plus minutes of the third period. They were largely content to cycle and play along the perimeter. Finally, at 3:31, the Capitals made it 6-1 as Irwin scored through a multi-layered screen including Attard (the puck went through his feet). The assists went to Schultz and Johan Larsson.
The Flyers, bunched in the offensive zone, gave up another counterattack to the Capitals. The lone defender back, Kevin Connauton, overcommitted and Ristolainen was unable to catch up to Eller breaking over the middle. After taking a pass from Anthony Mantha, Eller beat Jones one-on-one. Trevor van Riemsdyk, who triggered the breakout, got the secondary assist at 5:59.
Washington went on their second power play of the game at 9:05. York got the gate for slashing on a shift where the Capitals' fourth line again had the Flyers pinned in their own end. The Capitals did not score.
The Flyers had their first scoring chance in quite some time as Hayes came out on a line chance, took a pass on the tape from Brink, and was denied from prime scoring range by Samsonov with 7:46 left on the clock.
Wasington made it 8-1 at 12:42. On a point shot by Schultz that was headed well wide of the net, Hathaway deflected it past Jones. The other assist was credited to Iwin.
A parade of penalties ensued as frustrations boiled over at 13:43. Farabee got a pair of minors (hooking and cross-checking) and Konecny got a 10-minute misconduct. A pair of Washington penalties put the Flyers on a 4-on-3 power play.With 14 seconds of PP time left on the 4-on-3, a Hayes shot went off two players' skates -- the second one being van Riemsdyk -- for a power play goal. Brink received a secondary assist. The Capitals struck right back on the ensuing 5-on-4 time as Larsson scored, assisted by Schultz.
