The Washington Capitals aim to continue their ascent without the face of the franchise on Thursday when they host the Colorado Avalanche.
Sure, the Capitals have scored a whopping 27 goals during their five-game point streak (4-0-1), including 16 during an emphatic sweep of a three-game road trip that began with a 5-2 victory over the Avalanche on Friday.
That said, Washington was dealt a severe blow after superstar captain Alex Ovechkin sustained a lower-leg injury following a collision during the third period of Monday’s 6-2 victory over the Utah Hockey Club.
The Capitals labeled Ovechkin as week-to-week on Tuesday and placed him on injured reserve Wednesday. They recalled forward Ivan Miroshnichenko from the Hershey Bears of the American Hockey League in a corresponding move.
The loss of Ovechkin obviously is a substantial one. The three-time Hart Trophy recipient has scored 13 goals in his last 11 games to boost his career total to 868, which is just 27 removed from breaking Hall of Famer Wayne Gretzky’s all-time record of 894 set from 1978-99.
“It (stinks),” Capitals forward Nic Dowd said. “Hate to see it. He’s been absolutely on fire and he’s huge for our team. He’s our captain. You’ve got to score goals to win games. He’s been playing incredible hockey, so, yeah, I hate to see it.”
He’s not alone.
“(Ovechkin is) our leader,” goaltender Charlie Lindgren said, per the Washington Post. “He’s our bull. It’s tough to see him go down. … He’s a guy that’s doing it all right now, not just scoring. He’s the captain for a reason.”
Lindgren made 17 saves against the Avalanche to snap a modest two-game skid. He also handed Colorado its lone loss in its last five games.
The Avalanche rebounded from the setback to the Capitals and opened a four-game road trip on Monday with a 3-2 victory over the Philadelphia Flyers.
Defenseman Cale Makar scored two goals to boost his point total to 27 (eight goals, 19 assists) in 19 games.
“I felt like we were offensively rolling,” Makar said. “When the forwards are moving around, it’s fun for us as (defensemen). We can kind of move up top and create space. So yeah, I thought we were working out well.”
The former Calder, Norris and Smythe Trophy winner could have capped his performance with a hat trick, but his apparent tally was disallowed due to netminder interference.
“He got two, I’m not sure about the third one that was disallowed,” Colorado coach Jared Bednar said. “He got into some good areas on some nice plays from some other players on our team, (Nathan MacKinnon) fed across on the one right into the slot.
“Just picked the right spots, I felt like (on Monday), to get up in the rush and join, especially on the entries into the (offensive) zone. In the (offensive) zone play, he was pretty active. He found himself in the slot two or three times, all alone, and he didn’t make any mistakes on those.”
Casey Mittelstadt scored and set up a goal and Mikko Rantanen added two assists to lift his point total to 10 (six goals, four assists) in his past five games.
