Capitals’ Early Spark Fizzles as Canucks Snap Skid with Comeback Win
If there’s one unwritten rule in hockey that tends to hold up, it’s this: dominate the special teams battle-especially during 5-on-3s-and you usually walk out with the win. On Wednesday night in Vancouver, the Capitals flipped that script.
They cashed in on both ends of an early two-man advantage and killed off a longer 5-on-3 against them. And yet, they left Rogers Arena without the two points, falling 4-3 to a Canucks team that hadn’t tasted victory in 11 straight games.
For Washington, it was a night that started with precision and ended in frustration. The loss marks their fourth straight in regulation-the first such skid under head coach Spencer Carbery. And for a team that found a spark early, it was the kind of unraveling that’s becoming too familiar.
“We're just making too many big mistakes,” Carbery said postgame. “Massive, massive mistakes. You just can’t give away free goals in this league-it’s too competitive.”
Let’s rewind to the good part.
The Capitals came out firing, and when Vancouver handed them a 69-second 5-on-3 in the first period, they didn’t blink. Washington’s power play, which has shown signs of life lately, was clinical.
First, it was John Carlson at the point, feeding Tom Wilson low on the left. Wilson quickly zipped a pass across the crease to Dylan Strome, who buried it for a 1-0 lead at 8:25.
Then came the second unit, and the second goal. Alex Ovechkin-quarterbacking from the left wall-threaded a pass to Strome at the bottom of the right circle.
Strome one-touched it to Justin Sourdif, who tapped it home from the top of the crease. Just like that, it was 2-0 Caps before the halfway mark of the first.
But that’s where the momentum stopped.
Vancouver, desperate and hungry to break their 11-game winless streak, clawed their way back. David Kampf got it started with a hard forecheck, working the puck below the goal line before finding Brock Boeser in front. Boeser didn’t miss, picking the top right corner to cut the lead in half.
Then came a gut punch. With under two minutes to go in the opening frame, Washington won a defensive zone faceoff but failed to clear.
Evander Kane corralled the puck below the goal line and threw a low-percentage shot toward the net. It deflected off defenseman Matt Roy’s skate and in-just like that, it was 2-2 heading into the break.
The second period didn’t start much better for Washington. They found themselves in penalty trouble early, facing a 74-second 5-on-3.
Thanks to a couple of clutch faceoff wins and clears from Nic Dowd, they weathered that storm. But the relief was short-lived.
Just under three minutes after killing the penalties, Vancouver struck again. Kampf once again made life miserable for the Caps on the forecheck, this time setting up Drew O’Connor, who beat Logan Thompson on the stick side to give the Canucks their first lead of the night.
Then, during a 4-on-4 stretch, Vancouver capitalized again. Filip Hronek jumped into the rush and finished a slick feed from Jake DeBrusk, extending the lead to 4-2 with 8:17 left in the middle frame.
“Feels like it’s a tough league to hold a lead,” said Wilson, who returned to the lineup after missing eight games with a lower-body injury. “You take your foot off the gas for a second, and they jump. They got a couple bounces, and they were back in it.”
Wilson pointed to the Kampf play that led to the second goal-a heavy stick check on Rasmus Sandin that forced a turnover-and the unfortunate bounce off Roy’s skate as momentum shifters. But he also acknowledged the team’s inability to swing things back in their favor.
“We’ve got to do a better job flipping the momentum and getting back to work,” he said. “The effort’s there, but we’ve got to play more aggressive, take away time and space. They were hounding the puck better than us tonight.”
Washington made one final push in the third. With Thompson pulled for an extra attacker, Strome found the net again-his second of the night-cutting the deficit to 4-3 with 3:23 left.
But that was as close as they’d get. The equalizer never came.
Carbery didn’t mince words afterward.
“It’s a tough way that game goes down,” he said. “We build the lead early, then give it back in the last seven minutes of the first. We make a few mistakes, and it ends up in the back of our net.”
Despite the loss, Carbery didn’t think the second period was a disaster. But in a league this tight, “not terrible” isn’t good enough-especially when the mistakes are ending up behind your goaltender.
“We probably needed one in the second to keep it at one,” he said.
Instead, they head home with another regulation loss, a four-game slide, and more questions than answers. The Capitals showed flashes of the team they can be-sharp on the power play, resilient on the penalty kill-but the lapses in between are proving costly.
And in a league where every point matters, the margin for error keeps shrinking.