Takeaways From Capitals Loss To The Kraken

The Washington Capitals wrapped up their three-game homestand with a 5-3 loss to the Seattle Kraken, losing a first-period lead and dropping their first home game of the season on a pair of goals late in regulation.

It was a loss that did not leave Capitals coach Spencer Carbery happy postgame about the number of mistakes made by his club.

“We make some crazy decisions in bad times where I know I feel it on the bench and everybody in the building is like ‘what is that?’” Carbery said. “You just can’t do that at this level. If you wanna be a good team and you wanna compete, you can’t do that, and we do that consistently through. We just will work on it.”

Without Pierre-Luc Dubois, who missed his first game of the season with an illness, Washington was able to put together enough offense to be tied at 3 deep into the third, but Jared McCann scored with 5:27 left in regulation and left the Capitals without a point for the second time this season.

”[Dubois is] a huge piece of the team, and, you know, when you lose him, you’re losing a big presence up the middle, that plays in, you know, every situation for us,” Boone Jenner said afterwards. “And so, you need other guys to step up, and I think, hopefully, we’ll get it back here soon.”

Ryan Winterton scored an insurance goal late to seal the win for the Kraken.

The positives for the Capitals is a pair of forwards finally got in the goal column, as Jordan Kyrou and Alex Ovechkin netted their first of the season.

Kyrou connected with 8:19 left in the first period, taking a nice cross-ice feed from Cole Hutson and beating Kraken netminder Joey Daccord before he could slide over to tie the contest.

“It was great to get my first, finally,” Kyrou said. “I got a couple chances, and I feel that nice for them when you go in, and, you know, it was a great play by Cole Hutson there.”

Ovechkin netted his first of the year just over five minutes later, beating Daccord after a feed from Ilya Protas to give Washington their only lead of the game.

Ovechkin’s goal was the 930th of his NHL career, and his first overall in exactly six months, and first goal at home since March 31.

The Protas brothers both picked up an assist on the play, the fourth time both brothers have assisted on the same goal in the NHL, with Ilya not even having been born before Ovechkin’s Calder Trophy-winning season in 2005-06. It also is the first time Ovechkin has had a goal assisted by two brothers.

After the Caps took the lead, they surrendered a goal with 11 seconds left in the period, then fell behind in the second on a Frederick Gaudreau tally.

“I think that was a great start, I think,” Ovechkin said afterwards. “Sometimes those kind of things happen. 
Obviously, we didn’t follow in the second, and it was a good response [in the third], so we’re gonna learn from it.”

Washington began to press late in the frame, then pulled even when Jenner collected his own rebound and scored 46 seconds into the third. Jenner, who scored in the Capitals’ win over the Rangers Friday, now has 3 points in 5 games.

Logan Thompson, who had been unbeaten in his first three starts, surrendered the late goals for the most goals he has allowed this season, and absorbed his first loss of the season.

Thompson ended up with 22 saves on 27 shots, but the defense also didn’t do a whole lot to help out their goaltender at times. But unlike his previous starts, Thompson wasn’t able to erase mistakes and ended up with a subpar outing.

Afterwards, Carbery talked about the team’s poor execution.

“Giving them momentum and we couldn’t find a way out of it,” he said. “Turning it over and we’ll get it fixed, but it’s gonna take some time and guys have to learn we we need to become a more intelligent team.”

Washington drops to 3-2 on the year, and ends their first homestand with a 2-1 mark. The Capitals have a quick trip to Raleigh Tuesday before kicking off a five-game homestand Wednesday night against the Montreal Canadiens.