A 3-2 lead for the Washington Capitals evaporated in a five-minute stretch in the third period Sunday as the Vegas Golden Knights rallied for a 4-3 win.
Reilly Smith and Alex Tuch struck for the third period goals that gave Vegas the win, their 35th of the season.
Marc-Andre Fleury made 20 saves to pick up the win.
“It’s big for our confidence and just a learning experience for our team too, knowing that we can win these games,” Fleury said. “We’re down by one, we’re down twice, three times and we always played our way back. I was really confident about this game that our guys would play great from start to finish.”
It’s not entirely clear why confidence should be a concern give that Vegas is 35-13-4 on the season and there is not a team in the NHL that seems capable of a sustained effort against them.
Nicklas Backstrom, Chandler Stephenson and Matt Niskanen helped the Caps build that 3-2 lead through the early stages of the third period.
“Halfway through the third [period], we got a little passive,” Backstrom said. “Let them back in the game and they won it. A tough one.”
The Caps dropped to 30-17-5 with the loss.
“I thought we had the game,” Caps head coach Barry Trotz said. “It was 3-2, had a couple of open nets and missed those. That just came back and bit us. If we got it to 4-2, we’d have been in real good shape. We didn’t.”
Ryan Carpenter also scored and Smith scored the first of the night in the second period.
“It was a good bounce back game for us after our last game, a real tough loss,” Vegas head coach Gerard Gallant said. “We didn’t play that well. But today, everybody competed hard and everybody played the game that we’re supposed to play. It’s a huge win for us.”
[WATCH: All Golden Knights vs. Capitals highlights]
Philipp Grubauer made 27 saves in taking the loss.
“We had a lot more jump. That Minnesota game [on Friday], it seemed like we weren’t getting much offensively and maybe a little bit of tired legs. It looked like we turned that around tonight, which was our goal,” Smith said after his two-goal effort.
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