March 13 vs. Los Angeles Kings at Crypto.com Arena
Time: 10:30 p.m.
TV: MNMT
Radio: 106.7 THE FAN, Caps Radio 24/7
Washington Capitals (43-14-8)
Los Angeles Kings (34-20-9)
Two nights after opening their three-game California tour with a 7-4 victory over the Ducks in Anaheim, the Caps are back at on Thursday in Los Angeles, facing the Kings in the middle match of the trip.
Paced by the first NHL hat trick of Aliaksei Protas’ NHL career, the Caps also got three-point performances from P-L Dubois (one goal, two assists) and Alex Ovechkin (three assists). Ovechkin’s three-assist game was his second of the season; he also had three helpers on Feb. 9 against Utah.
“It was fun,” says Dubois of the victory in Anaheim. “There was a lot of back and forth, and I thought a lot of guys played well. Those games like this, there’s 2-1 tight games and there’s 6-4 – or whatever it was – tight games. [The Ducks] did a lot of good things out there. They’re a team with a lot of young guys that have a lot of energy, that just go on the rush, and it’s not easy at times. I thought we played well tonight.”
Protas’ first goal of the game came three seconds after an offensive zone draw, and it tied the score at 2-2 late in the first period. His second goal came early in the third – off a sublime play and setup from Dubois – and it restored the Washington lead at 4-3, less than a minute after Anaheim had pulled even.
In the game’s final minute, Ovechkin unselfishly fed Protas for the empty-net goal to fill out his first hat trick, rather than attempting to close the narrowing gap between himself and Wayne Gretzky for the top spot on the NHL’s all-time goals list.
Last Friday night in Washington, Protas recorded two goals – one of them shorthanded – and three points (two shorthanded) in a span of less than eight and a half minutes to fuel a 5-2 comeback win over the Red Wings. He is demonstrating the ability to suddenly alter the course of hockey games.
“I don’t think it’s crazy to call him a star player in this League,” said teammate and sometimes linemate Connor McMichael, a day after that performance against Detroit. “He has really taken that next step, and a good example was [Friday] night. That’s what star players do; when not much is going on, he takes over the game. I can’t be happier for him; he’s one of the hardest working guys I’ve ever played with. He is really detailed in practice, working on the little things he thinks he needs.”
Protas turned 24 in January, and he is years shy of reaching his prime, but has now delivered 28 goals and 58 points in 65 games this season. He has more than quadrupled his goal total (six) from last season, and he has doubled his point total (29) from ’23-24, doing so in 13 fewer games.
“I think maybe the only thing I could add to what I feel like we've talked about for the last week,” begins Caps coach Spencer Carbery, “is just the timeliness of especially that [second] goal, when third period. It’s a good example of losing momentum, [facing] adversity; you could feel the tension in the game start to build. And so we get the lead; we cough it up right away.
“So now – all of a sudden – we've lost momentum, and the building comes alive. And for them to score that next shift right there, and him to finish in tight, that's not an easy finish in there. You don't have a lot of time. You're in tight on top of the goaltender. … So for that finish right there, just the clutch-ness of that goal right there was a huge moment in the hockey game.”
Tuesday’s victory in the opener of the trip extends Washington’s winning streak to five games. Although they fell behind briefly in the first frame after Dylan Strome started the scoring with his 20th goal of the season at 2:07 of the first, the Caps started right on time and turned in one of their better starts/first periods in the last couple of weeks, pouring 19 pucks on Anaheim netminder Lukas Dostal.
“We weren’t loving our starts the past couple of games, and that was one of the points we wanted to do,” says Dubois. “It’s never going to be perfect, but I thought we did a better job and took a step in the right direction.”
The steps the Caps took in the right direction on Tuesday also involved stepping to the middle of the ice and the front of the net. All their goals came from below the dots, and Washington was highly opportunistic in finishing those chances and second chances in front of Dostal.
“They play man-on-man,” says Dubois of the Ducks. “So, if you get a little bit of movement, there might be a second or two where a guy gets open, but the reality of it is you get open when you crash the net. If there’s a rebound in the corner, they don’t know who is going to get it, and that’s when it kind of opens up. That was the key tonight. I thought the [defensemen] did a good job of finding lanes, and the rest was just for the forwards to get it off the wall and get it going again.”
The Kings carry a three-game winning streak of their own into Thursday’s contest, and it comes on the heels of a five-game Los Angeles slide (0-3-2). The Kings downed the New York Islanders here by a 4-1 count on Tuesday in the opener of a three-game homestand. Nashville comes in on Saturday to close out that home stay for LA.
Los Angeles is on track for a fourth straight season above the .600 point-percentage plateau, and it is also headed for a fourth straight Western Conference playoff berth. The Kings are also veering towards a fourth straight first-round Stanley Cup playoff collision with their personal postseason nemesis, the Edmonton Oilers. The Oilers have prevailed in each of those three series, winning in seven, six and then five games, respectively.
