For the third time in as many games and the League-leading ninth time this season, the Capitals mounted a comeback to win a hockey game on Friday afternoon at Capital One Arena. Less than 48 hours after they managed their first third-period comeback of the season – rebounding from a 3-2 deficit to win in the third in Tampa – the Caps did themselves one better. They came back from a two-goal deficit in the third to claim a 5-4 overtime victory over the New York Islanders.
Jakob Chychrun won it for Washington with his seventh goal of the season at 1:20 of the extra session. And just as they did two nights earlier in Tampa, Dylan Strome and Tom Wilson scored massive third-period goals to get the game to overtime. Wilson’s third-period goal was his second of the game.
Chychrun gained New York ice straight down the middle, and using a defender as a screen, he rifled a shot past ex-Caps goalie Semyon Varlamov from between the circles to give Washington its second overtime victory in three tries this season.
For Chychrun, it was his third career overtime game-winner.
“Just a lot of room to skate,” replies Chychrun, asked what he saw on the game-winner. “I just tried to get on my horse and get some speed through the neutral zone, and I backed them off a bit. I was able to get a pretty good look from just above the tops of the circles.”
While the Capitals have played the part of road warriors this month, they’ve struggled on home ice for much of November. In their final home game this month, the Caps quelled a four-game home losing streak (0-3-1) with Friday’s victory.
For the third time in as many games, the Caps yielded the game’s first goal in the front half of the first frame. From the right dot, Simon Holmstrom took a feed from Anders Lee and beat Caps’ goalie Logan Thompson with a snipe of a shot to the short side at 3:36, putting the visitors up by a goal.
Washington’s fourth line issued a quick response to the Holmstrom strike, squaring the score just 74 seconds later. After Brandon Duhaime carried into New York ice, he sent it back up the right wing wall to Ivan Miroshnichenko, who delivered it right back down low for Nic Dowd. Dowd curled to the front and snapped a backhander past Varlamov from the top of the paint to knot the game at 4:50.
The Caps grabbed the lead on a tic-tac-toe power-play tally, Strome to Connor McMichael to Wilson for the one-time finish from the bumper at 12:10. It was the first of three helpers for McMichael on the afternoon.
Washington took that lead to the room at first intermission, but it all slipped away in the middle 20 minutes.
Early in the second, Lee did what he has made a career of doing, tipping pucks home from in front. Noah Dobson put the puck in the general zip code of the Caps’ cage, and Lee reached out and deflected it off the ice and over Thompson’s right pad at 1:15 to make it a 2-2 contest.
The game stayed that way until late in the second, when John Carlson appeared to have restored the Caps’ lead on a delayed penalty. Alas, the Isles issued a successful coach’s challenge, alleging that Hendrix Lapierre had interfered with Varlamov. Carlson has three goals this season; he also has three goals that were taken off the board by opposing coach’s challenges.
From there, things took a quick turn in a southerly direction for Washington.
Less than half a minute after completing a penalty kill, the Isles went up by a goal when Kyle MacLean ended a lengthy goal drought, lighting the lamp for the first time since April 15 – a span of 24 games – to put New York back on top at 16:28.
Less than two minutes later, the Isles increased their lead to two when Holmstrom deflected a Dennis Cholowski left point shot home for his second goal of the game at 18:09.
Down two goals entering the third, the Caps benefited immediately when Taylor Raddysh drew a hooking call on Lee just five seconds into the period. The Islanders have yielded the most goals in the NHL in third period and in overtime as well, so they found themselves in familiar territory.
Strome put a rocket over Varlamov’s glove on the ensuing power play at 1:20, making it a 4-3 game.
Ahead of the midpoint of the third, Wilson got it tied up with a one-timer from the left dot off a perfect tee-up from Trevor van Riemsdyk. Wilson was unmarked on the weak side for what seemed like an eternity, and he was locked and loaded when the pass came his way.
“I was getting open for [McMichael] originally,” recounts Wilson. “He made a great play to Riemer, and then Riemer made an awesome pass. We’ve got a lot of great players in here, and Riemer is having an awesome year. I’ve just got to put that in the net at the end of the day.”
He did. Wilson’s second goal of the game came at 7:24.
With the game all even, Thompson made all the stops the rest of the way, including a big glove stop to deny Holmstrom’s bid for the hat trick from the slot, a couple of minutes into the back half of the frame.
Late in the third, Washington went shorthanded, giving New York an opportunity to win it in regulation. But the Isles were held without a shot for the rest of regulation; four different Washington defensemen laid out to block New York’s last four shot tries of the third; the first three of those came while the Isles were on the power play.
With their 0-for-3 afternoon with the extra man, the Isles fell to 1-for-23 on the power play in their last 11 games.
“They scored on that one; it doesn’t matter. We made a turnover on the second one, and it’s a 4-4 game. We had a power play, and it was awful. We didn’t generate [anything] on that one … Our power play is going to have to produce. Tonight, it was the difference. They scored two goals, and I don’t know if we generated some chances on that first unit.”
New York’s failure with the extra man set the stage for Chychrun’s overtime heroics, giving the Caps their ninth comeback victory out of 16 overall this season.
“I look at it two ways,” says Caps’ coach Spencer Carbery of his team’s League-leading total of comeback wins. “I appreciate the resiliency and the character of our group. I don’t like that we’re putting ourselves in those situations, but we’ve got a lot of fight and a lot of character in that room that isn’t just going to lay down.”
