The Washington Capitals continue to succeed without Alex Ovechkin and aim to extend a two-game winning streak when they host the New York Islanders on Friday.
Ovechkin will be out for another 3-5 weeks after the superstar forward sustained a fractured fibula on Nov. 18.
Washington lost its first two games in Ovechkin’s absence but rebounded with a pair of wins in the Sunshine State — a 4-1 result over the Florida Panthers on Monday and a wild 5-4 comeback victory over the Tampa Bay Lightning on Wednesday.
Despite trailing three different times against the Lightning, the Capitals continually fought back and finally took the lead on Tom Wilson’s power-play goal at 16:34 of the third period.
“When stuff happens and there’s ups and downs, you find a lot out about your team and your teammates,” Wilson said. “And I couldn’t be more proud of the group and proud of our goalie (Charlie Lindgren) and just everybody stepping up. A pretty gutsy, gutsy effort tonight.”
New York’s own comeback effort in Wednesday’s 6-3 loss to the Boston Bruins was undermined by another late breakdown. The Islanders twice came back to equalize after falling behind in the first two periods, but Boston then scored three unanswered goals over the final 10 minutes of play.
The Islanders have allowed a league-high 36 goals in the third period this season.
Despite just two wins in the Islanders’ last nine games (2-4-3), head coach Patrick Roy feels his team’s results don’t reflect the quality of play.
“We’re not giving (up) 40 shots, we’re giving 21 (against Boston),” Roy said. “We’re not giving up 22 scoring chances, we’re giving 10 or 12. So, we do a lot of good things. … But I realize that we’re making mistakes at key times that cause goals.”
New York’s struggling special-teams units rank 31st in the NHL in both power-play percentage (12.5) and penalty-kill percentage (70.2). The latter statistic is particularly frustrating since the Islanders have taken the fewest penalties (56) and served the fewest penalty minutes (121) of any team in the league.
Washington’s penalty-kill percentage (84.7) is the fourth-best in the NHL.
The Capitals’ 6-2-1 record in their last nine games has been aided by a resurgent power play. Washington is 8-for-20 on power plays over that stretch, after going just 4-for-46 with the extra attacker in their first 13 games.
Per Washington’s usual goalie rotation, Logan Thompson should start Friday since Lindgren faced the Lightning. Thompson is 9-1-1 with an excellent 2.44 goals-against average and .917 save percentage in 11 starts this season.
Since the Islanders also play Saturday at home against the Buffalo Sabres, goalies Ilya Sorokin and Semyon Varlamov are expected to split the back-to-back starts in some order. Varlamov could be in line to face the Capitals after Sorokin allowed five goals on 20 Bruins shots Wednesday.
After collecting just 10 points (seven goals, three assists) in the Islanders’ first 20 games, Brock Nelson has tallied three goals and four assists in New York’s last three games.
Dylan Strome leads the Capitals with 31 points (seven goals, 24 assists).
