Caufield scores twice, Canadiens top Capitals to push point streak to 7

MONTREAL -- Cole Caufield scored twice for the Montreal Canadiens in a 6-2 win against the Washington Capitals at Bell Centre on Saturday.

Nick Suzuki had a goal and two assists, and Mike Matheson and Kirby Dach scored for the Canadiens (33-17-9), who have points in seven consecutive games (5-0-2). Jakub Dobes made 27 saves.

“I liked how we battled,” Canadiens coach Martin St. Louis said. “We were in the game, we took advantage of our chances. The thing I liked most about the game was how we managed the third period. We had a bigger lead, but they scored a goal and it was just a two-goal lead. We managed that better. We kept playing in the third period.”

Alex Ovechkin scored his 920th and 921st career goals for the Capitals (31-24-7), who had won three in a row and six of seven, including a 3-2 victory against the Vegas Golden Knights on Friday.

“I didn’t mind some of the things that we did tonight,” Washington coach Spencer Carberry said. “I thought we created enough offensively, we just made too many catastrophic mistakes to be able to sustain that.”

Anthony Beauvillier had two assists, and Charlie Lindgren made 19 saves.

“(Lindgren) played great,” Capitals forward Nic Dowd said. “I’m sure he’s going to be upset at himself, but he played awesome. He gave us a chance to win that game. It was 1-0, 1-1, 2-1, until it quickly got away from us, but he made a couple of big-time saves early that kept that game at 1-0, 1-1, or 2-1.”

Caufield gave Montreal a 1-0 lead 30 seconds into the first period. He blocked Jakob Chychrun’s shot at the left point and raced forward to recover the puck before driving in alone and scoring on a wrist shot past Lindgren’s glove from the right hash marks.

Ovechkin tied it 1-1 at 13:16 when he put away a loose puck from the right edge of the crease after Declan Chisholm’s one-timer from the left point struck Beauvillier in front of the net.

Caufield gave Montreal a 2-1 lead at 14:19 with his third goal in two games. He was on the right side of the goalmouth to put in Suzuki’s pass across the crease.

“I thought the puck was finding me early and it’s pretty cool to get those two early,” Caufield said. “But getting chances is the most important thing.”

Matheson extended it to 3-1 at 12:22 of the second period when he drove the slot to take a pass from Zachary Bolduc and deked Lindgren before shooting past his glove as he cut to the right.

Dach pushed it to 4-1 at 16:34 after he took a pass back from Suzuki at the top of the right face-off circle and scored on a one-timer glove side.

Ovechkin’s second goal of the game cut it to 4-2 at 12:12 of the third period with a shot from in front.

Suzuki scored into an empty net at 16:44 to make it 5-2.

“There are some points in the game where we were probably sitting a little too far back,” Suzuki said. “Sometimes you get uncomfortable when you keep losing the lead and you’re trying to be a little bit too safe, so I thought we did a better job of not being too safe out there.”

Jake Evans then shot the puck the length of the ice for a short-handed goal at 18:35 for the 6-2 final with Lindgren pulled for the extra attacker.

“I thought we played well in the first, I thought we played well in the second, and they’re a good team, too,” Dowd said. “They took advantage of some opportunities and a couple of mistakes by us, so two empty-netters cap off a 6-2 game.”

NOTES: Ovechkin (998 total goals) is two away from becoming the second NHL player to have 1,000 total goals, regular season and playoffs combined. Ovechkin has 921 goals in 1,553 regular-season games and 77 in 161 playoff games. Wayne Gretzky scored a total of 1,016 NHL goals, including 894 in the regular season and 122 in the playoffs. … Suzuki recorded his 25th career three-point game, the most by a Canadiens player since he entered the League in 2019-20. The next closest is Caufield (10).