Three years ago Monday an unknown minor-league coach took over the floundering Capitals and quickly turned them into one of the NHL’s elite teams.
But in recent days Washington has more resembled the pre-Bruce Boudreau Caps than the Stanley Cup contender it fancies itself. The latest example was an ugly performance on Monday night at Prudential Center against the New Jersey Devils. Washington allowed three goals in the first period alone, including a penalty-shot tally by Mattias Tedenby, and never recovered in a 5-0 loss to the Devils, a once-proud franchise that entered the night with the NHL’s second-worst record.
The Caps instead made New Jersey look like the mid-1980s Edmonton Oilers. They managed just four shots in the first period. Their rookie goalie – coming off a shaky performance Friday in Atlanta during a 5-0 loss – allowed two more questionable goals and wasn’t helped at all by his teammates.
Braden Holtby – subbing for Michal Neuvirth, the expected starter – allowed three goals on the first nine shots he faced and five on 23 shots overall. But other than Jason Arnott’s wraparound score at 16 minutes, 15 seconds of the first period and another by Arnott in the second period when he couldn’t find the puck, Holtby at least held his own. A pair of fine stops on 2-on-1 breakaways for New Jersey in the second period actually kept the score from getting worse.
“Today we just embarrassed ourselves out there,” said Washington defenseman John Erskine. “We had one good player and that was Holtby. If he’s not in net it could have been a 10-0 game.”
Early in the day, Boudreau announced Neuvirth as his starter. But the 22-year-old tweaked a lower-body injury during the morning skate. The club tried to rush goalie Semyon Varlamov into town from AHL Hershey. He made it. Unfortunately, his skates didn’t.
So Neuvirth served as the official back-up goalie until Varlamov was ready to go early in the second period. But because he himself is recovering from a lingering groin issue and had played back-to-back games for Hershey over the weekend, Washington had no intention of actually using Varlamov. Holtby was going to have to take whatever the Devils through at him.
Washington (14-6-2, 30 points) has allowed 10 goals in its last two road games alone and 14 goals in regulation in its last three. During Boudreau’s tenure, which began Thanksgiving Day, 2007, it’s hard to remember a short stretch of hockey as bad as this one.
“I’m not used to this,” said Boudreau. “We’ll have to deal with it. But in the first period I knew [the Devils] would be dangerous after the way they played in St. Louis [in a 3-2 loss Saturday]. They’re close to turning the corner.”
They did that and more against the Caps. Patrik Elias scored on a power-play deflection 5:49 into the game to put New Jersey ahead 1-0. Holtby came too far off his post late in the period and watched in horror as Arnott used his long reach to circle the net and jam home an easy goal. When Tedenby was taken down by Erskine with 1:46 left in the first period and scored on the subsequent penalty shot the 3-0 hole was too big to escape. Arnott and former Cap Dainius Zubrus put the game out of reach with goals in the first eight minutes of the second period.
“I honestly didn’t feel terrible. The first period just didn’t seem to go our way,” Holtby said. “Two inches either way on their first and third goals -that’s just what happens in hockey,” said Holtby, who didn’t find out he was playing until just before pre-game warm-ups. “I wanted to come out and have a strong performance. I don’t think I did, but there were some positives to take out of it.”
