Caps Suffer Shootout Setback, 2-1

For the Caps, the points are the point. Chasing the season and a quartet of teams between them at the second wild card berth in the Eastern Conference and with barely more than two weeks remaining, Washington is running out of runway.

The Caps desperately needed a pair of points on Wednesday night at Capital One Arena, and they played well enough to get them. But at night's end, they came out on the short end of a 2-1 shootout decision, settling for a single point on the front end of a difficult set of back-to-back games.
"It's tough," says Caps' coach Peter Laviolette. "It's tough that we lost the game, lost the point. The point is the big thing right know. It's frustrating. It's tight out there. We knew it was going to be this way; we expected this type of game - low scoring, not a lot of shots, not a lot of chances.
"It played out exactly how we thought it would, and I thought we were pretty good at holding our patience and not exposing ourselves to something that could come back the other way, and it ends up going to a shootout, so it's tough. The overtime, I thought we did some really good things and had some really good looks, but we couldn't end it there and it goes to a shootout."
As he has done in most of his 51 starting assignments this season, Caps' goaltender Darcy Kuemper gave his team a chance to win. Just Wednesday morning, Laviolette remarked on how well Kuemper played in Saturday's heartbreaking 4-3 loss to the Penguins in Pittsburgh, noting the lack of defensive support in front of him on a night in which all four Pittsburgh goals were scored on breakaways or odd man rushes.
Wednesday's game was against a different opponent and it was an entirely different story. The Caps supported Kuemper defensively, supplementing his 28-save effort with a combined total of 26 blocked shots on the night, and holding the Islanders without a shot on net for a span of nearly 17 minutes of playing time at one point.
Unfortunately, the Caps weren't able to muster much in the way of offense themselves. Washington was held without a shot on net for over 13 minutes in the latter stages of regulation, and it was never able to play with a lead on this night.
New York winger Pierre Engvall entered Wednesday's game with three goals on as many shots in three games against Kuemper in his NHL career, and he made it 4-for-4 when he scored the game's first goal at 3:52 of the second period, seconds after the Islanders' dry spell of 16 minutes and 57 seconds without a shot on net came to an end.
Washington responded quickly, getting even on Conor Sheary's nifty backhand shot from the slot at 6:22, a shot in which his back was to the net at the time of release.
"The puck just came to me in the slot, and I had a little bit of room," recounts Sheary. "I thought I could catch him by surprise with the backhand, maybe sliding away. I don't really score on my backhand too often, but I caught him on that one."
Alex Ovechkin rang a crossbar earlier in the game, but even that shot came from some distance. Time and space were at a premium for both sides on Thursday in Washington, and the lone power play of the game was an abbreviated one of 28.8 seconds in duration, a 4-on-3 advantage for the Islanders at the end of overtime. The best saves by both goaltenders came late in the third and in the extra session.
Not a single penalty was whistled all until six minutes remained in the third, and that's when matching minors were assessed, resulting in a couple of minutes of 4-on-4 hockey. Kuemper denied the red-hot Zach Parise - who entered Wednesday's game with five goals in his previous six contests - on a one-time bid from point black range to keep the score even at 1-1.
Minutes later, New York netminder Ilya Sorokin made a similar stop on Alaiksei Protas' bid from the slot, a shot that came from just a bit more distance than Parise's.
In overtime, T.J. Oshie had a couple of good looks for Washington, only to be stopped by Sorokin, who also flashed a pad to deny an Ovechkin backhander at the doorstep. A Tom Wilson shot caught iron.
Kuemper caught a Bo Horvat shot off the mask early in the extra session and denied Noah Dobson from in tight, but he didn't have to make any stops during New York's brief power play; Nic Dowd got in front of the only shot the Isles were able to launch.
The Islanders entered the game with an 0-5 record on the season in shootouts, but they erased the goose egg with goals from Horvat and Kyle Palmieri while only Evgeny Kuznetsov was able to find the range for Washington.
"We've needed it," says Isles coach Lane Lambert of his team's first shootout victory. "And I thought the guys did a real good job, Bo and Kyle and then obviously Ilya in net. So it's an important point for us for sure."
Now, the Caps head south to Tampa for a difficult Thursday night date with the Lightning, who were home and idle on Wednesday following a 4-0 road win in Carolina on Tuesday.
"Every time we play these guys there seems to be not a lot of room, and especially at 5-on-5,' says Sheary of the Islanders. "And when you play pretty much of 60 minutes at even strength, it's hard to create. They're always back, they're always above the rush, they're sound defensively.
"We had opportunities to score; they did too. I thought it was a pretty even game and we fought through and through to the end. It went to a shootout, and unfortunately, we couldn't get it done. But there was not a lot of room out there."