Caps Overcome Preds, 5-3

These are uncertain times in the NHL with games being postponed and lineups in a constant state of flux. Following an unscheduled break of 10 days, the Caps returned to action against the Nashville Predators on Wednesday night, the first meeting between the two teams in 23 months. Despite the lengthy layoff, the two teams tangled in an entertaining and physical affair, with the Caps prevailing 5-3 at night's end.

Evgeny Kuznetsov's shorthanded goal snapped a 3-3 tie with 5:36 left in the third period, helping the Caps to their first win over the Preds in more than five years and snapping Nashville's seven-game winning streak.
Both teams played without some key regulars, and after the Caps roared out to a 3-0 first-period lead, Nashville came right back and evened the game at 3-3 in the front half of the second. The two sides traded extra-man opportunities, pushes, shoves and momentum the rest of the way, and Washington banked the two points when Kuznetsov surveyed from behind the Nashville net as time ticked away on a 4-on-4 sequence. Unable to find a viable option in front, Kuznetsov curled out from behind the cage and fired a shot on the short side, over the left shoulder of Nashville netminder Juuse Saros.

"I was behind the net and I wasn't sure if it was still 4-on-4 or shorthanded," recounts Kuznetsov. "I kind of stepped out and looked for the pass, but I think Johnny [Carlson] was swinging there, and he wasn't open so I decided to shoot. I didn't have a great shot this game, but I saw a little room there and that's where I shoot there."
Playing for the first time since Dec. 19 and with a handful of players in and out of the lineup since then, the Caps roared out to a strong start in the first.
First, they cashed in on an offensive zone shift, moving the puck - and their bodies - around the perimeter of the Preds' zone crisply and efficiently. Tom Wilson pushed it up to the right point where Alex Ovechkin collected it and went to Carlson, stationed just above the goal line below the left circle. Carlson perfectly fed Lars Eller for a back-door tap-in at 3:15 of the first, putting the Caps up 1-0.
It was the beginning of a four-point night (one goal, three assists) for Carlson,
In the back half of the frame, the Caps doubled their lead mere seconds after Ilya Samsonov made a stellar stop to deny Philip Tomasino from in tight. Dmitry Orlov collected the puck and sent Nicklas Backstrom out of Washington's end of the ice. In neutral ice, Backstrom feigned a feed to Connor McMichael, but opted to keep it instead. As he approached the Nashville line and attracted a quartet of white sweaters, Backstrom put a typically sublime pass to Carlson on the weak side. From the top pf the right circle, the defenseman snapped a shot past Saros at 13:11, extending the lead to 2-0.
Late in the first, the Caps as again went 200 feet to light the lamp. Michal Kempny broke it out, sending Carl Hagelin into Nashville ice along the left-wing wall. From the half wall, Hagelin hit Nic Dowd perfectly at the far post, and he slipped it home for a 3-0 Washington lead at 18:52.

Nashville started the second period with a carryover power play, and it got on the board two seconds after the expiration of that man advantage. Samsonov stopped Tanner Jeannot's shot, but Yakov Trenin was there to bury the rebound, making it a 3-1 game at 1:23 of the second.
Just over six minutes later, the Preds pulled even with a pair of goals just 35 seconds apart. Nashville made it 3-2 with a Luke Kunin rush goal at 7:03. Kunin went to the back door and converted a fine feed from Eeli Tolvanen from the left half-wall.
After a television timeout, the Preds won an offensive zone face-off and tied the game when Filip Forsberg tipped Dante Fabbro's center point shot through Samsonov's pads at 7:38. Laviolette exercised his timeout at that juncture, and the rest of the period was scoreless.
"I didn't mind the last seven or eight minutes of the second period," says Caps coach Peter Laviolette. "They got some looks at the beginning of the second and they capitalized. It started with that [Trenin] goal and it unraveled a little bit from there.
"I thought we did a good job of getting our composure toward the second half of the second period, and I thought we played a really smart and strong third period."
As Laviolette notes, the Caps pulled it together in the second half of the middle frame, and they were strong throughout the third. Saros made a series of excellent stops in the third, denying Wilson and Garnet Hathaway in 1-on-1 situations and denying Kuznetsov from the doorstep on a Washington power play while the game was still even at 3-3.
After Kuznetsov restored the Washington lead, Hagelin iced it with an empty-netter at 18:57 of the third, accounting for the 5-3 final.

"I thought in the first period we gave them some looks," says Predators coach John Hynes. "I thought we were a little bit loose in our rush defense and then we had a couple of breakdowns where we gave them easy looks, and they're a real talented team so they're able to capitalize on those situations.
"We came out in the second period and tightened up some things without the puck - which helped us - and then we got more of our attack game going and wound up tying the game. From there, it was a pretty tightly contested game. There was a lot of physicality and a lot of special teams in the game, and they found a way to get the game-winner tonight and we didn't."