Kings falter against Carlson, Capitals
They give up two goals to defenseman in the first period and can’t recover.
John Carlson scored twice, Ilya Samsonov stopped 22 shots and the Washington Capitals defeated the Kings 3-1 on Wednesday night in Staples Center.
Tom Wilson also had a goal to help the Capitals win five games in a row for the second time this season. They won six consecutive games Oct. 25-Nov. 9.
Blake Lizotte had a goal and Jonathan Quick made 19 saves for the Kings, who lost for the third time in their last 10 home games.
Carlson continued his strong start to December by placing a shot over Quick’s right shoulder from the right point to put Washington ahead 1-0 at 4 minutes 36 seconds of the first period.
It was Carlson’s 100th goal, becoming the fifth Capitals defenseman and the 13th American-born defenseman to reach the plateau.
“Really great player,” Kings defenseman Drew Doughty said of Carlson. “Really good on the power play, good shot. He’s a threat because he can just feed it over to [Alex] Ovechkin obviously, but he has a good shot too, so you can’t just sit on Ovechkin because he’ll put it in from where he is standing too.”
Carlson made it 2-0 at 13:27, getting Quick to commit too early and scoring around the prone goalie.
The Kings started well before finding themselves trading chances with the Capitals, and Carlson was there to strike for his third multigoal game and 13th multipoint game in 30 games this season.
Lizotte scored at 3:20 of the third period, poking in a loose puck after Samsonov could not control it behind his net.
Wilson scored an emptynetter at 18:41.