Carlson extends point streak to seven, Capitals defeat Ducks

WASHINGTON-- John Carlson extended his point streak to seven games with two assists, and the Washington Capitals defeated the Anaheim Ducks 5-2 at Capital One Arena on Monday.

Carlson has 11 points (one goal, 10 assists) during the streak. He has 11 multipoint games this season.
Richard Panik, Alex Ovechkin, Chandler Stephenson, Jakub Vrana and Tom Wilson scored for Washington (16-3-4), which is 13-1-2 in its past 16 games, outscoring opponents 64-45. Braden Holtby made 32 saves.
WATCH: [All Ducks vs. Capitals highlights]
"We controlled the puck, we controlled the game, and you can see the result," Ovechkin said. "Obviously, we tried to stick together. It's a very good sign and big points."

Sam Steel and Nicolas Deslauriers scored, and John Gibson made 26 saves for Anaheim (10-10-2), which is 1-4-2 in its past seven games.
"I think at the end of the day, we've just got to tighten up our game," Anaheim defenseman Erik Gudbranson said. "We weren't as sharp as we have been in the past. This is one of the better teams in the National Hockey League. You better bring your 'A' game to come into this building and take a win."
The Capitals took a 1-0 lead 50 seconds into the game. Travis Boyd passed from behind the Ducks net to Panik in the left face-off circle, and his wrist shot beat Gibson for his first goal of the season.
"He's been around it the last couple of days, the last few games," Washington coach Todd Reirden said of Panik. "Getting some good chances. Felt like his game was really coming. That's great for him to get that first one and build from there."
Gibson kept the score 1-0 when he made a left-pad save to stop Vrana on a breakaway 2:06 into the second period.
"We need him," Ducks coach Dallas Eakins said of Gibson. "We're a team in transition. We're trying to do a number of things on the fly, and between [Gibson] and [Ryan Miller], we need them both every night."
Ovechkin made it 2-0 when he converted a cross-ice feed from Evgeny Kuznetsov after a pass from Carlson for a power-play goal at 6:39 of the second.

The Capitals increased the lead to 3-0 with 33 seconds left in the period when Stephenson scored from the high slot off a pass from Garnet Hathaway as a fight broke out behind the Ducks net.
"I actually thought that the play had been blown down because all of the players were involved in the scrum," Eakins said. "It even looked like [Gibson] was distracted by it so, even when [the referees] were at the penalty box, I didn't think it was going to be a goal."
Among the penalties, Anaheim's Nick Ritchie received a game misconduct for being the third man in during the fight, and Hathaway received a match penalty for spitting on Gudbranson.
"It's a bad thing to do," Gudbranson said. "It's something you just don't do in a game, and he did it."
Hathaway said of spitting, "Yeah, it has no place. It was an emotional play by me. You don't plan any of that stuff in your head and it was a quick reaction and unfortunately the wrong one for me to a [Gudbranson] sucker punch."
Adam Henrique scored on the power play early in the third period for Anaheim, but the goal was immediately waved off due to incidental contact on Holtby by Rickard Rakell.
Vrana made it 4-0 when he poked in his own rebound at 5:44 of the third period.
Steel scored a power-play goal to make it 4-1 at 13:31 of the third period, and Deslauriers pulled the Ducks within 4-2 with 1:49 remaining before Wilson scored into an empty net off a pass from Carlson with 11 seconds left for the 5-2 final.

They said it

"That's an excellent hockey team. That's a Stanley Cup champion from two years ago. We had a full dose of where we'd like to get to as a team in the future." -- Ducks coach Dallas Eakins
"We knew forechecking was going to be a big part of our game. We were able right away to start off with some offensive zone time and converting. Obviously, some things in the third got a little loose. But I liked for the most part a lot of the stuff that we did in the first two periods." -- Capitals coach Todd Reirden

Need to know

Anaheim had won three straight games against Washington. … Ovechkin has 254 power-play goals, one behind Teemu Selanne for third in NHL history. … Washington is 11-1-2 when it scores first. … Boyd has six points (one goal, five assists) in eight games with Washington.

What's next

Ducks: At the Florida Panthers on Thursday (7 p.m. ET; FS-F, PRIME, NHL.TV)
Capitals: At the New York Rangers on Wednesday (8 p.m. ET; NBCSN, TVAS)