On Monday afternoon, the Capitals held 2-0 and 3-1 leads in the first and second periods on home ice against the Nashville Predators.
But the Preds responded with five unanswered goals in a 6-3 stunner over the Caps in Washington, DC.
Six different skaters struck for the Predators as they ended a six-game losing streak.
Ryan Johansen, Viktor Arvidsson, and Rocco Grimaldihad goals and multi-points efforts in the win.
“It was a great win by our team, especially going down 3-1,” Grimaldi said. “We could have hung our heads and thought, ‘Oh it’s one of those games again, we just can’t get out of the slump,’ but the boys stuck together. I think every line chipped in and we had a huge win against the Stanley Cup champs.”
Miikka Salomaki, Frederick Gaudreau and Ryan Ellis chipped in on the scoresheet with single markers.
“We get the lead, 3-1, and I think we give them a little room to breathe, don’t put pressure, and I don’t think we played our game at all today,” Alex Ovechkin said.
Pekka Rinne made 22 saves in the win which ended a 10-game road losing streak.
“You’re preaching something and you’re looking for some results to build some confidence off what you’re asking the players to do,” Predators coach Peter Laviolette said. “Tonight, I think we got that with the pucks at the net. There were some rebounds. We were able to get second opportunities off of it so that was a good thing.”
Michal Kempny and Jakub Vrana scored in the first period to give the Caps the 2-0 lead and Chandler Stephenson struck in the second to give them a 3-1 cushion ahead of the surge from Nashville.
“Their urgency level, [the] desperation from them was at a high tonight,” Capitals coach Todd Reirden said of Nashville. “We knew it was going to be. They’re too good of a team to be losing six in a row so we knew they would come hard.”
[WATCH: All Predators vs. Capitals highlights]
Braden Holtby made 28 saves in the loss.
“They were pushing really hard, pucks leaked through a little bit. It’s a tough one today but we’re going to forget this quick and [are] already focusing on the next game,” Vrana said after the loss.
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