The Capitals squashed the Penguins 6-3 on Saturday to take a 3-2 series lead, putting the two-time defending Stanley Cup champs on the brink of playoff elimination and putting the Capitals on the brink of ending a curse that has plagued them and all of us for over two decades. There was a feeling of inevitability that Pittsburgh would find a way to win those series even though the Capitals had been the superior regular-season team both times.Washington once again had a better regular-season record than Pittsburgh this term, but there has been no inevitability about this year’s series.
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With a 6-3 win Saturday, the Caps are heading back the Pittsburgh, with two shots at advancing.
The latter point could still very well end up happening, but they enter Monday’s Game 6 (9:30 p.m. ET, NBCSN, live stream) in Winnipeg facing a must-win situation, needing to win back-to-back games against a Jets team that has given them fits in their second-round series.
Vrana, 22, was the unlikely hero of Game 5, assisting on Kuznetsov’s tying breakaway goal 52 seconds into the third period and then scoring the game victor with 4:38 left. We’ll enjoy it tonight. History suggests a Caps struggle.
Maybe because there aren’t many that can accurately describe the anguish Washington has felt during much of the Ovechkin Era, one filled with postseason failure after postseason failure, many of them coming with the team on the precipice of a breakthrough.
The Capitals have not been to the conference finals in 20 years. He has five points (one goal, four assists) in five games against the Penguins.
Alex Chiasson scored Washington’s only goal of regulation, a shot from the right circle that gave the Capitals the lead in the second period. The Capitals received a dose of good news on May 6 when coach Barry Trotz said center Nicklas Backstrom will travel with the team after leaving in the third period of Game 5 with an upper-body injury. The problem was that they could not get past the Pittsburgh Penguins in the second round. That’s an easy storyline because we ended up winning. “We know the history”. He’s scored three goals and has tallied three assists. That set up a 2-on-1 breakaway, with Alex Ovechkin feeding Vrana for the deciding goal. In this series, Washington has scored first in three of the five games.
“Nobody expected we were going to be in this position before this season, in this game and in this playoffs”, he said. Chiasson’s shot slipped under Murray’s left arm for his second career playoff goal and first in more than four years when he played for Dallas.
“I think you’ve got to look at Holts first”, forward T.J. Oshie said.
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“It starts as a group”, said Predators defenseman P.K. Subban. Coach Mike Sullivan would say the performance “might have been our best game of the series”. “We just have to build off of this one, but we did a lot of good things”.
