Kuznetsov, Capitals take Cup rematch
Evgeny Kuznetsov continued his dominance against the Vegas Golden Knights, scoring a goal and assisting on three more as part of a 5-2 Capitals victory Wednesday night in Washington in a rematch of last season’s Stanley Cup Final.
Kuznetsov assisted on two goals by Alex Ovechkin and one by Nicklas Backstrom and scored his own on the power play. The leading scorer in the Cup Final with eight points in five games, Kuznetsov has seven points through the defending champions’ first three games of the regular season.
“If you play with the good players, you’re always gonna get points,” Kuznetsov said after one of the best all-around games of his career. “It’s just about have fun every night you go out there. If you don’t have fun and you don’t want to enjoy, you don’t want to play hockey, you should be retired. But you can see we always have fun.”
Coming off a 49-goal season and a Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP, Ovechkin has four goals in three games. The 610th and 611th goals of his career put him in sole possession of 17th on the NHL’s career list, passing Bobby Hull.
Braden Holtby, who made “the save” with his stick in Game 2 of the Final, stopped 29 of 31 shots and bailed out his teammates during an especially sloppy second period. Holtby allowed goals to Cody Eakin in the second period and Reilly Smith in the third.
Vegas goalie Marc-Andre Fleury, who wanted to start this game instead of facing his former team in Pittsburgh on Thursday night, allowed four goals on 28 shots. His teammates hit the post a handful of times and went 0 for 3 on the power play. FLYERS 7, SENATORS 4 >> Jakub Voracek and Scott Laughton scored two goals apiece in Ottawa, Ontario, and Philadelphia rebounded from an embarrassing loss. Sean Couturier, Robert Hagg and Claude Giroux also scored for the Flyers, who were coming off an 8-2 loss to the Sharks in their home opener a night earlier. COYOTES 3, DUCKS 2 (SO) >> The Coyotes’ Nick Cousins scored the only goal in a shootout to lift Arizona to a win in Anaheim. It is Arizona’s first win of the season after losing two games without scoring in either. Ryan Kesler scored a firstperiod goal for the Ducks in his first game of the season. STORM SURGE >> The Carolina Hurricanes are bringing the Lambeau Leap to their hockey rink. Their post-victory parties have gone viral: After each win on home ice, they’ve skated en masse down the ice and jumped into the glass.
Consider it the latest sign that this isn’t the same team that has missed the playoffs an NHL-worst nine straight years.
“Instead of the standard, everybody goes to center ice and holds their stick up, we’re trying something new,” veteran winger Jordan Martinook said. “I think we had fun with it, and I think the fans liked it, so just keep an eye out on those. We might change it up, stick with that one, who knows?”
They call it the “Storm Surge,” and they’ve already done it twice to rave reviews from the fans who stuck around after the final horn.
It debuted following Carolina’s 8-5 victory over the Rangers on Sunday. After the buzzer sounded, the team lined up along one blue line and clapped their hands over their heads while DJ Khaled’s “All I Do is Win” played over the arena’s sound system. STASTNY OUT 3 GAMES >> Golden Knights center Paul Stastny will miss at least three games with an undisclosed lower-body injury.