Washington Capitals heat up with third straight in Toronto Maple Leafs shutout 2-0 -NHL Update
Washington and captain, Alex Ovechkin, are fired up as they grabbed their third straight victory as Capitals shutout the struggling Toronto Maple Leafs team, 2-0, Sunday night, March 11, 2012, at the sold-out Verizon Center in Washington, District of Columbia.
Capitals feared that they might not make the postseason with their poor performance this time around but it seems that Washington has finally managed to turn themselves around now.
They now stand at the number eighth spot in the Eastern Conference with 76 points, four ahead of ninth place Winnipeg Jets and close to overtaking third number South Eastern division rivals, Florida Panthers, who have 77.
"It's always nice when you're back-and-forth, back-and-forth, and you're still in it," Alex Ovechkin said. "It's nice when you know, like, the season's not over."
Brooks Laich got the first of the night and his 14th of the 2011-2012 National Hockey League (NHL) regular season on a turnaround as the team was shorthanded. Laich took off towards the Toronto net with full speed and fired it past Jonas Gustavsson
midway through for the quick lead.
"We do the same play," Washington coach, Dale Hunter, said. "It's a little high risk, so if you read it right, you get breakaways off of it. ... (Laich) is watching it to learn from it, and you pick up anything. He wants to win, and he's kind of like a coach."
After a scoreless second period and without a single penalty in the remaining 40 minutes, Mathieu Perreault tipped in the loose puck after teammate, Alexander Semin, failed to get it past Gustavsson 42 seconds into the third.
Toronto just cannot find a way to win these past few games and their style of playing has to change for something to happen before it is too late, something which head coach, Randy Carlyle is realising.
"Are we sacrificing risk hockey for offense? Yeah, I would agree with that," Carlyle said.
Washington is set to jump straight up into the third number spot as they have the next against New York Islanders on Tuesday.
Toronto Maple Leafs will be the team to decide whether Washington moves up or not as they playoff against Florida Panthers the very same day. Losing could keep Panthers at number-three while winning would get Capitals up there.
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