Caleb Jones stuffed a rebound past Ilya Samsonov with 3:39 remaining in overtime and also tallied an assist to lift the host Chicago Blackhawks to a 5-4 victory against the Washington Capitals on Wednesday night.
Chicago regrouped after Washington’s Conor Sheary scored on a one-timer from Alexander Ovechkin with three seconds left in regulation, tying the game at 4.
Alex DeBrincat scored two power-play goals, including the go-ahead score with 5:00 remaining, as the Blackhawks had a season-best three goals on the man advantage.
DeBrincat, Philipp Kurashev and MacKenzie Entwistle scored in a 34-second span in the second period and Marc-Andre Fleury made 42 saves.
The Capitals outshot the Blackhawks 46-28 but lost for the second time in three games.
After playing to a scoreless first period in which Washington owned a 13-6 advantage in shots on goal, the teams combined for five goals in the second.
Chicago cashed in on 17 seconds of 5-on-3 time early in the period, with DeBrincat and Kurashev beating Samsonov 18 seconds apart. Entwistle punctuated the flurry with a goal at even strength 16 seconds later.
Lars Eller, Sheary and Ovechkin each had a goal and an assist for the Capitals. Eller has scored in three straight games.
T.J. Oshie had two assists, Daniel Sprong also scored for Washington and Samsonov made 23 saves.
Brandon Hagel, Kirby Dach and Patrick Kane had two assists apiece for Chicago.
Washington welcomed the return of veteran forward Nicklas Backstrom, who missed the club’s first 28 games with a hip injury that persisted from last season. Backstrom wasted little time in getting re-acclimated, notching the secondary assist on Ovechkin’s power-play goal that opened the scoring with 16:24 remaining in the second period.
Ovechkin stretched his point streak to six games with the goal, which marked the 274th of his career on the power play, tying Dave Andreychuk atop the all-time NHL list.
The Capitals’ Evgeny Kuznetsov was placed in COVID-19 protocols Wednesday and did not play. Kuznetsov ranks second on the team in points behind Ovechkin.
Teammates Nic Dowd and Trevor van Riemsdyk returned to the lineup after missing the past four games in COVID protocol.
The Blackhawks swept the season series from the Capitals. Chicago edged Washington 4-3 in a shootout on Dec. 2.
–Field Level Media
