Penguins Beat Capitals 3-2

Photo by Patrick McDermott/NHLI via Getty

The Washington Capitals fell to the Pittsburgh Penguins 3-2 on Wednesday night at Capital One Arena. The loss dropped the Capitals record to 2-1-1 for the season. The Capitals next head back out on the road for a tilt with Marcus Johansson and the red-hot Devils in Newark on Friday night. Puck drop is 7:00PM.

Christian Djoos started in place of Taylor Chorney on the bottom defensive pair with Aaron Ness. This was Djoos’ first career NHL game. Tyler Graovac started in place of Nathan Walker on the 4th line. Braden Holtby got the start in goal for the Caps with Matt Murray getting the start for the Penguins.

#Caps‘ lines tonight vs. Pens: 65-19-77, 8-92-13, 10-20-39, 91-83-25. Defense: 44-74, 9-2, 29-55. Holtby vs. Murray. #CapsPens

— Mike Vogel (@VogsCaps) October 11, 2017

Tonight’s attendance was 18,506, the Capitals 365th consecutive sellout at Capital One Arena. Andre Burakovsky played in his 200th-career NHL and Capitals game.

FIRST PERIOD
The Penguins started the scoring with a power play goal by Kris Letang at 5:22 of the opening frame.

The period would end with the Penguins leading 1-0. The Penguins outshot the Caps 9-7 for the first period. The Penguins had three power plays and the Capitals just one. One of the penalties was called on Braden Holtby for a delay-of-game infraction for this bold defensive maneuver.

SECOND PERIOD
The Penguins would stretch their lead to 2-0 with an additional power play goal by Patric Hornqvist at 8:20 of the middle frame. The power play was setup by a penalty on Christian Djoos.

However, Chrsitain Djoos would make up for it, halving the Penguins lead with a blistering slapshot from the top of the right circle at the 19:07 mark of the second period.

Kid’s got that juice #ALLCAPS pic.twitter.com/DfWmTaUlir

— Washington Capitals (@Capitals) October 12, 2017

The call from John Walton:

The period would end with the Penguins leading 2-1. The Penguins outshot the Capitals 15-8 for the second period, and led in shots on goal 24-15 after two periods of play.

THIRD PERIOD
The Penguins would quickly regain the two goal lead with another power play tally, this time by Conor Sherry just 38 seconds into the final frame. All three of the Penguins goals came on the man advantage.

Alex Ovechkin would cut the lead to a single on the end of a nice feed down low from Christian Djoos at the 12:51 mark of the final frame.

8 for 8 #ALLCAPS pic.twitter.com/TCKXyJUBhN

— Washington Capitals (@Capitals) October 12, 2017

John Walton with the call:

The Capitals had numerous scoring chances in the waning minutes of the game but were unable to find the back of the next. The Penguins win it, 3-2.

Shavings:

The Capitals 44 shot attempts at 5v5 led the game. That marked the highest total for the Capitals over the last three games.
The Capitals won 38 of their 67 face-offs (57%), including 7-of-10 shorthanded (70%) and 15-of-23 in the defensive zone (65%).
The NHL box score can be found here.

Postgame interviews (audio)
Braden Holtby
Barry Trotz

By Jon Sorensen

SCENES FROM CAPITAL ONE ARENA

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