Washington improves to 6-0-0 on the season PHILADELPHIA — The Capitals passed their toughest test yet of this young NHL season.
On the road at Wells Fargo Center against Eastern Conference rival Philadelphia, Washington scored three goals in a span of 2:25 early in the third period to break open a tight game en route to a 5-2 victory.
Alex Ovechkin scored two goals, including a power-play tally early in the third period, Mathieu Perreault registered a goal and an assist and Nicklas Backstrom had two assists as the Caps shook off a shaky second period to remain perfect on the season.
Washington improved to 6-0-0 with 12 standings points, continuing the best start to a campaign in the franchise’s 37 years. The Caps remain unbeaten heading into Saturday’s showdown with the Detroit Red Wings at Verizon Center. Detroit (4-0-0) is the only other NHL team without a loss.
“[The Flyers] are a good team. Teams like that are going to make plays, and they’re going to pinch you in their zone,” goalie Tomas Vokoun said. “I give them credit. We had our [good] shifts. They had theirs. Sometimes it comes down to who scores that extra goal. We had a couple lucky bounces and opened the game wide open. Except for that it was a pretty close game.”
And close games are nothing new for these two teams. They played four times last season, and each went to overtime or a shootout. Each team came away with two wins as they split the season series. Not this time, however.
An uneven first period saw both sides leave power-play chances on the board. Ovechkin took a needless interference call just 39 seconds into a 4-on-3 power play. Washington was 0-for-3 with the man advantage.
The Flyers took the lead at 14:25 when Alexander Semin tried to dangle at the blueline and Wayne Simmonds swept the puck out of the zone and right to teammate Claude Giroux. He deked Vokoun (40 saves) on the breakaway for a pretty goal and a 1-0 lead.
Washington answered late in the period, however. With 80 seconds left, Scott Hartnell turned the puck over in the Flyers’ defensive zone. Perreault knocked the puck down and fired a low, hard shot that deflected off Philadelphia defenseman Braydon Coburn’s stick and went in. With just 11.8 seconds left the Flyers got sloppy again. Backstrom had a late stuff attempt that deflected across Ilya Bryzgalov’s crease, where a waiting Ovechkin slammed the puck home for a 2-1 lead.
The Flyers controlled play in the second period with 14 shots on goal, and they generated several quality scoring chances against Vokoun. But it was Washington that thought it had a 3-1 lead until Backstrom’s backhand goal was wiped out by referee Tim Peel, who ruled Ovechkin and possibly teammate Troy Brouwer made incidental contact with Bryzgalov.
But the Caps got their insurance goal early in the third period at 2:23 when Roman Hamrlik’s point shot snuck by Bryzgalov for a 3-1 advantage. Just 91 seconds later Ovechkin earned his second of the night, somehow ripping a power-play shot from the slot even with Flyers forward Max Talbot all over him. Then just 54 seconds later, Joel Ward tipped home a shot by defenseman Jeff Schultz to put the contest away.
“You try to get [Bryzgalov] to move around and search for pucks,” Ward said. “A little bit of traffic, any goalie will tell you it’s not the best to have guys in front of you. That’s what we’ve been trying to do — those types of goals, not just the pretty ones.”
