Acrobatic Holtby captures Lightning in a bottle
WASHINGTON — Capitals goaltender Braden Holtby reached out to make a brilliant glove save on Tampa Bay Lightning forward Ondrej Palat’s slap shot early in the third period on Monday.
It was a critical save at a time when the Lightning were down 1-0 and pressing for the equalizer.
Still, Holtby didn’t consider it a dazzling stop.
“I mean, that’s one of those that probably looks more difficult than it actually is,” said the 28-year-old Canadian.
“It was just the position, where the puck was. I was just trying to stay in the moment, focus on one puck at a time and I happened to make the save on that one.”
Holtby had the same calm demeanor after the game that he had during it, when he made 24 saves in a 3-0 win in Game 6 of the NHL Eastern Conference final at Capital One Arena.
It was his first shutout of the postseason and fifth in the Stanley Cup playoffs, one shy of the Washington record set by Olaf Kolzig in 2003.
Facing elimination at home, the Caps looked determined to hit everything that moved.
The goal was to finish checks on Lightning players as often as possible — though at one point Devante SmithPelly decked Dan Girardi and took teammate Jay Beagle down with him.
“I apologized to him,” Smith-Pelly said. “I said sorry. He didn’t seem to care.”
The Capitals made no apologies for taking the body and grinding out the physically punishing win to set up a deciding Game 7 in Tampa on Wednesday.
The winner faces the Vegas Golden Knights, who are in the Stanley Cup final in their first season.
TJ Oshie scored on the powerplay and into an empty net while Smith-Pelly notched the back-breaker, but it was the bruising style that kept the Caps alive and could still pay dividends.
“You’ve got to wear them down,” Smith-Pelly said.
“Every game, if guys are going to be playing 25, 30 minutes, it’s tough when you’re getting hit every single shift. We’ve been on the body all game and all series. If it shows up in Game 7 where guys are starting to get tired, then it was all worth it.”
Alex Ovechkin, Tom Wilson and Brooks Orpik led the charge on Monday, throwing their bodies around all night like human wrecking balls.
The Capitals outhit the Lightning 39-19 and outshot them 34-24, bruising and battering them all over the ice.
“It’s desperation, really,” Orpik said. “You try to empty the tank as much as you can on every hit.”
While Tampa Bay goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy was again on top of his game in stopping 31 of 33 shots, Orpik said the Capitals wanted to give back to fans for their energy and did so by laying out the Lightning players.
Tampa Bay captain Steven Stamkos said the Capitals simply “executed their game plan” and the Lightning didn’t respond.
“They played with that desperate hockey and we should have matched it and we didn’t,” added Tampa winger Ryan Callahan said.