His team defeated the Philadelphia Flyers in Game 3 of their first-round playoff series, 6-1, putting it in position to complete a sweep in the best-of-seven showcase on Wednesday.
Advertisement
Ovechkin, who is Washington’s all-time regular-season leader in goals (525), points (966), power-play tallies (379) and game-winners (88), extended his club playoff lead in goals to 39 with a pair on Monday and also notched an assist.
Speaking of history, Ovechkin set a new franchise record on Monday for career points in the postseason, with 74, surpassing Dale Hunter’s 72. The best opportunities came on the power play, with Los Angeles generating numerous chances on one opportunity late in the second period without scoring.
It helped lead to a couple of more goals, Ovechkin getting his third of the series and fourth-liner Jay Beagle wrapping it with a goal with 1:40 left and with Mason’s save percentage sinking to a humiliating.778. By that point, much of the crowd had left and there weren’t many bracelets left to throw. The Flyers are 0-for-8 on the power play, while the Capitals have scored three goals on the power play. When asked about it after the game, he said, “I don’t care”. Second star went to Alex Ovechkin for his two goals – one of which resulted in being the game victor – an assist, three hits and five shots on goal.
Despite a strong push in the back half of the period that saw Philadelphia take 22 out of the final 23 shot attempts of the middle stanza, they could not best Holtby.
Sure enough, the wristbands kept coming, and the Flyers were whistled for a bench minor for delay of game.
“We pulled the game away and they weren’t interested in playing anymore”, Trotz continued.
Beyond those wounds, however, the Capitals are now up 3-0 in the series and are poised to emerge from this round looking extremely risky.
I think it’s safe to say the majority of fans in Philadelphia think the actions of a few were terrible and inexcusable.
Philadelphia went back to the power play on a Karl Alzner interference penalty at 9:42.
“Still pick up the minus second game in a row”, Kuznetsov said, shaking his head at being on the ice for Philadelphia’s lone goal of the night.
Bellemare got a five-minute major and game misconduct for checking from behind, while Gudas and White got 10-minute misconducts. And we have a hard time clearing them.
The Flyers lost in their first home game since founder Ed Snider’s death last week.
It was the Flyers who took the lead inside the first minute with Michael Raffl opening the scoring at the Wells Fargo Center. The Caps had mostly skill players on the ice, but as soon as someone put a hand on Bellemare, all hell broke loose for a second. “We’re on national television, I don’t think it displays our game very well”. Having given up on winning, Philadelphia adopted more of an inflict-some-pain mentality over the last 20 minutes.
The Flyers had his initials “EMS” painted on the ice behind each goal, and handed out bright orange T-shirts with Snider’s silhouette imposed over the Flyer crest. Kuznetsov hadn’t scored in the series to that point, but he accepted the gift and worked a pretty deke around Mason for a 3-1 lead.
NOTES: The start of Monday’s game was delayed as the Flyers paid tribute to their longtime chairman, Ed Snider, who died at age 83 on April 11 after a long battle with bladder cancer.
After Caps forward Brooks Orpik got injured after a heavy hit by Ryan White, fans booed the battered player.
Advertisement
Seguin didn’t travel to Minnesota for Game 3 of the first-round series against the Wild, and is day to day.
