Bonino has winner as Pens beat Caps

“He’s another one of those players where his best hockey seems to be when the stakes are high”.

“Braden Holtby has got to be way better”, Olczyk said. The goal is to win four out of seven, and it really doesn’t matter how you do that. Forget the Caps’ peculiar history of beating the Pens in Game 1s in eight of nine previous series over the decades and, every time but once, losing anyway. It’s not about that. While Pittsburgh won Game 1, they likely aren’t too proud of how they played.

“The playoffs are made of big moments”, Holtby told reporters.

The pesky Tampa Bay Lightning, lifted by outstanding play from its backup goalie at one end of the ice, used a counterattacking strategy to nearly clinically exploit and capitalize on the Penguins’ up-tempo, puck-pressuring style. Both players have evolved since they debuted during the 2005-06 season and started going toe-to-toe, motivated by the internal fire that makes each one a generational player. Another notable statistic wrinkle: The Penguins have an 82-63 edge in scoring chances as defined by Corsica Hockey.

But Grubauer couldn’t rescue the Capitals, allowing a power-play goal to Kessel on the second shot he faced 2:19 with Shattenkirk in the penalty box for putting the puck over the glass.

“Typically we’re going against Crosby’s line and that’s a tough task, he’s a great player”, Oshie said. We’ve got to find some goals for him, too. Still, the Caps played very well for 58 minutes.

He wasn’t necessarily trying to one-up Penguins captain Sidney Crosby, who had given the Penguins the lead with two earlier goals.

“That was the message”. “They capitalized on a couple of mistakes in the second, and that changed the game”. “We’ve just got to go home and regroup”. Usually, a seven-game head-to-head match is a process of one team imposing its style and will on the other. “I don’t know if that’s good or bad, but I don’t think you should ever get used to that”.

Philipp Grubauer replaced Holtby for the third period for his first appearance in the playoffs.

Nearly eight years after their “dueling hat tricks” game, Ovechkin answered Crosby with his fourth goal of the playoffs, but his team couldn’t compensate for the Penguins captain’s greatness.

What’s said matters little if the Capitals don’t get the job done on the ice in Game 3 on Monday night in Pittsburgh (7:30 p.m. ET, NBC Sports). Early success last season covered up some of the team’s deficiencies, so the Capitals didn’t have the occasional lengthy postgame discussions like this year’s team did.

But Trotz said after their Game 1 loss to the Penguins, his team needed to get off to a better start the next game.

Washington no longer has the luxury of time.

New Jersey won the draft lottery, vaulting four teams – including the last-place Colorado Avalanche and expansion Vegas Golden Knights – for the right to the first pick in the draft after having just an 8.5 percent chance of winning. At the end of the season, five will be unrestricted free agents and six will be restricted free agents.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – For one glorious period for fans here Saturday night, the Washington Capitals finally looked like the team we expected to see in the postseason.

Faceoffs aside, teams try to play a different brand of hockey on the road, often playing it safer in the process. You can say that, in a lot of ways, they’ve saved our game since they first came into the league, from lockouts and what have you.