Caps stun Rangers with big comeback win
The Washington Capitals are one of the hottest teams in the NHL for a reason. The New York Rangers are one of the coldest teams in the NHL for a different reason. The two clubs reminded the hockey world of those reasons Sunday night in Madison Square Garden.
The game represented a good chance for the road-weary Rangers to get some good vibes going on home ice. It looked like the Rangers were about to do just that after they went up 3-1 on the Capitals in the first period after falling behind 1-0. It was a tremendous start, with goals scored by J.T. Miller, Chris Kreider and a devastating power-play marker from Dan Boyle with 1:57 to go in the period. The Rangers also out-shot the Caps 15-7 in the opening frame.
That’s the kind of period the Rangers would have easily built off of earlier this season. But since mid-November, nothing has come easy for New York and it didn’t in the second period against the Capitals.
Here’s three things to know about what happened when the Capitals turned that 3-1 deficit into a stunning 7-3 win.
The Caps started slow, but stormed back to beat the Rangers. (USATSI)
1. The Capitals scored six straight goals to come back and pull away
Washington stormed back with four straight goals in the second, including a pair 1:36 apart within the first seven minutes of the frame. Evgeny Kuznetsov shoveled home a beauty of a backhander at 5:25 of the second period. T.J. Oshie followed that up after collecting a fortuitous bounce off the end boards, weaving through traffic and whipping the puck past Henrik Lundqvist to tie the game.
Just over four minutes later, Alex Ovechkin scored from a familiar spot in the left faceoff circle on the power play for his 17th goal of the season. With just a minute to go in the second, Justin Williams snapped home his second goal of the game on the power play to make it 5-3. The wind was fully out of New York’s sales by this point.
But that was OK. The Rangers still had plenty of time to get back in the game, right? Well, the Capitals had other ideas.
The Rangers went to backup goalie Magnus Hellberg, slotting in for New York’s regular, but injured backup Antti Raanta. Hellberg has just one game of NHL experience and that lasted just 12 minutes for the Nashville Predators in 2013-14. This time didn’t go so great either.
The first two shots Hellberg saw found the back of the net. First, Jason Chimera scored on a shorthanded breakaway to make it 6-3. Marcus Johansson was next, snapping one past his fellow Swede, just 2:10 later. Welcome to the NHL, kid.
2. The Rangers’ dramatic tumble after a great start to the season continues
It was a dramatic and shocking collapse for the Rangers, by far their worst loss of this recent stretch in which they have dropped 11 of their last 14. Making matters worse for New York, the Capitals put even more distance between themselves and the rest of the division.
Exactly one month prior to Sunday night, the Rangers were on top of the Metropolitan with a 14-3-2 record, five points clear of the Capitals. Over the last four weeks, the two teams have traded spots and the Rangers are finding their divisional rivals pulling away. New York now trails Washington by eight points in the division standings. What a difference a month makes in what has been a wild year across the NHL.
The Rangers are only one point clear of the New York Islanders for third place, too. Lucky for them, the rest of the Metro hasn’t really established much consistency. The next closest team after the Islanders is the New Jersey Devils, who are still six points back of the Rangers.
The cushion they built up in that incredible run to start the season was definitely helpful as they remain in playoff position, but now it’s eroding away and the team hasn’t seemed to find a way to stop this slide.
3. The Capitals look unstoppable right now
Washington is just the second team in the NHL to reach the 50-point mark this season. They’ve gotten there by winning 12 of their last 14 games and certainly look like the class of the East, if not the entire league. This recent run also includes wins in five straight.
On top of all that, Madison Square Garden has not been all that kind to the Caps in recent years. There was the recent playoff ouster at the hands of the Rangers and even earlier this year, the Caps got rolled over in a 5-2 loss. Goaltender Braden Holtby had won just three games in the building coming into this one.
History doesn’t matter when you’re on a roll, though, and Holtby is rolling right along with the rest of the team. He is now 21-4-1 this season and owns a .931 save percentage. He’s having the kind of year that will draw him a ton of Vezina buzz and looks like the front-runner right now.
Meanwhile, Ovechkin is heating up again with three goals over his last two games. So is Oshie, who now has five goals over his last four games and 13 on the season.
We’re not going to crown the Capitals in December, but this year feels different than all the rest when the Caps were a dominant regular-season team. They’ve gotten tremendous goaltending, boast a deep defense and a forward group that is so difficult to stop. Throw in a great head coaching performance by Barry Trotz and this group looks like they’re poised to have a truly special season.
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