In Buffalo, the Washington Capitals’ Alex Ovechkin scored late in the third period on Friday night, to tie the Sabres, 3-3, and force extra time, which solved noting.
“It was a bouncing puck,” the Caps’ Evgeny Kuznetsov said. “And every time the puck is bouncing like that, I think it’s hard for the goalie, especially, you know, big man when he’s shooting from there it’s tough to catch the puck.”
Ovechkin was then credited with the deciding strike in the skills competition for the 4- win.
Ilya Samsonov made 20 in the Washington win.
Anthony Mantha also scored for the Caps, his strike gave them a 1-0 lead.
The Capitals moved to 36-20-10.
Nick Jensen put the Caps up, 2-1, after Jeff Skinner scored the first of his two goals on the night.
“I thought we did really good early and then I think right at the time they put their push on in the second period, I think we kind of let up a little bit,” Jensen said. “So it wasn’t completely us giving them that game, I think they earned a lot in that second period and that’s why they kind of jumped ahead. But I thought after that goal, that third goal they had, we had a good shift and kind of got our momentum back going and kind of equalized the game a little bit there, and allowed us to get a point and then in the shootout the extra point.”
Skinner tied the game, 1-1, and then tied it again, 2-2.
“I think we battled the entire game,” Buffalo coach Don Granato said. “We just weren’t sharp. We didn’t have our A-game tonight and we battled that, but we battled it the right way. … It was a positive sign to see. I didn’t think our guys felt their game, but they figured out how to play when you’re not feeling good and against a really tough team. So we found a way to get a point and we were in there, and could have almost gotten two points.”
Buffalo dropped to 23-33-9.
“[Casey Mittelstadt’s] line was rolling around in there for maybe a minute before we got out there,” Skinner said. “We knew that they were tired. … [Carlson] lost his helmet so 5-on-4 for a little bit there. It was a nice play by ‘Sammy’ to recognize I was open there. I just tried to get in and take as much space as I could, and fortunately it went in.”
The Sabres grabbed a 3-2 lead just past the midway point of the third period, off a strike from Victor Olofsson.
Dustin Tokarski made 37 saves in the Sabres loss.
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