Caps Host Canucks
Caps finish off weekend set of back-to-backs with Sunday matinee at home vs. Vancouver
The Caps conclude a weekend set of back-to-backs when they host the Vancouver Canucks on Sunday afternoon at Capital One Arena. Washington started the weekend on the good foot, with a 2-0 blanking of the Islanders in New York on Saturday afternoon.
Saturday's victory was the Caps' first of calendar 2022, and it halted a four-game slide (0-2-2) for Washington. Vitek Vanecek stopped all 23 shots he faced in his first start in nearly four weeks, and Tom Wilson's goal early in the first proved to be all the offense the Caps' sophomore netminder needed. Vanecek's whitewashing of the Islanders came in the Caps' first ever visit to New York's new home, UBS Arena.
Adversity has been a virtually constant companion for the Caps this season, and Saturday's game in New York was no exception. Playing for the first time after a four-day break, the Caps learned just before warm-ups that they would be without winger Conor Sheary, who entered the COVID-19 protocol on Saturday. If that wasn't bad enough, they also lost right wing T.J. Oshie to an upper body injury early in the first period. Oshie left the game after taking two shifts totaling 1:46.
In between his previous start on Dec. 19 and Saturday afternoon's starting assignment against the Islanders, Vanecek was in COVID-19 protocol. His lone appearance during that time came in a relief effort in Monday's 7-3 loss to the Bruins. Vanecek yielded three goals on 15 shots in 32 minutes of work in that contest.
"He played really well; that's the only way to put it," says Wilson of Vanecek. "He stood in there. He's probably our best player the whole night, and he's had a good year. There's been some ups and downs, and every game day there is a lot of different stuff going on. He did a great job coming off of a difficult last couple of weeks for him, and he stood in there and really helped get us the win."
Less than three minutes after Oshie exited for the afternoon, Wilson scored to give Vanecek all the offense he would need. Alex Ovechkin netted his 25th goal of the season - and the 755th goal of his NHL career - into a vacant New York net with 10.2 seconds left to seal the victory for the Capitals.
During its four-game slide, the Caps played well for long stretches of every game, but they struggled to muster a full and cohesive 60-minute effort. On Saturday against the Isles, they were strong from start to finish, but their second period was stellar. They held New York to just a single shot on net in the second, and they owned a lopsided 17-3 advantage in shots attempts at 5-on-5 in the middle frame.
"Our first three shifts, we kept their two starting [defensemen] on the ice," says Caps center Nic Dowd, referring to the second period. So we had a great start, which is huge. In some of these games we've lost, we've given up a goal early in the second. That hurts. You come out after playing a good first, and then we give up a goal early in the second and the team is right back into it and we've lost momentum."
Dowd was referring to Islanders blueliners Zdeno Chara and Noah Dobson, who were on the ice for the first 2:37 of the second period while the Caps' forward corps went through three shifts. That single shift represented more than 10 percent of Chara's workload (18:14) for the day.
"I think we've just got to stay the same way, even keel," says Dowd, when asked what the Caps will need to do to replicate Saturday's performance on Sunday against the Canucks. "We can win a game 1-0 or 2-0, and that's no big deal. Our special teams has to continue to be good, and the biggest thing is I think our [defensemen] moved the puck so fast into our forwards' hands that we barely spent any time in our [defensive] zone."
The Canucks are nearing the end of what has been a rugged five-game trip out East for them. Sunday's matinee match is the fourth game of a journey that ends in Nashville on Tuesday night, and Vancouver is still seeking its first win and its first scoreboard lead of the trip.
Vancouver started the trip with a 5-2 loss to the Panthers in Florida on Tuesday, and it fell 4-2 to the Lightning in Tampa two nights later. While the Caps were shutting out the Islanders on Saturday afternoon, the Canucks were absorbing a third straight setback, this one a 4-1 defeat at the hands of the Hurricanes in Carolina.
Prior to their current three-game skid, the Canucks had been as hot as any team in the League, going 8-0-1 in their first nine games under former Caps coach Bruce Boudreau, who replaced Travis Green as Vancouver's bench boss in early December.
Vancouver has had seven of its games postponed this season, and six of those contests are home games. The Canucks last played at home on Dec. 14 when they downed the Blue Jackets, 4-3. Sunday marks their seventh straight road game since then.
