*Photo from The Hockey News*
More history is being made for the great 8. Alex Ovechkin scored two goals, Dylan Strome had a goal and an assist, and the Washington Capitals defeated the Calgary Flames with a 5-2 victory on Monday night in Calgary.
The Capitals picked up their 3rd straight win and moved into a playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. Ovechkin's two goals gave him a 20 goal season, the 19th season in a row he's reached 20 goals. He's the 6th player in NHL history to have at least 19 seasons of 20 goals or more.
Strome said of Ovechkin's landmark "That's pretty impressive, I think. It's impressive. He's a world-class player. He's a Hall of Famer. There's not many things that haven't been said about him, but he keeps doing it, even at age 38. It's fun to be a part of, fun to watch."
The first period's only goal came from Strome, who scored his 23rd goal of the season. Ovechkin scored on a power play 5:58 into the second period to double the Capitals lead to 2-0. He scored again at the 9:16 mark of the second on the power play before Kevin Rooney scored for the Flames, making it a 3-1 game.
Hendrix Lapierre scored at the 14:22 mark of the second period for the Capitals, making it 4-1 on his 8th goal of the season. MacKenzie Weegar cut the Flames deficit to 4-2 when he scored 7:13 into the 3rd period, assisted by Mikael Backlund. With 2:29 left on the clock and the net empty, Tom Wilson scored for the Capitals to make it a 5-2 final.
Lapierre said of Ovechkin's two goal showing that "We're all cheering for him. Everyone's super happy when he scores. Obviously, everyone's super happy when everyone scores, but I feel like there's a little something extra with O. And it was two really big goals tonight, too. We're just super happy for him and we're just trying to help him in this chase. He's looking pretty good.
Getting the start in goal for the Capitals was Charlie Lindgren, who picked up his 3rd straight win to improve to 18-11-5 in 35 starts. Lindgren stopped 34 of the 36 shots the Flames sent his way, giving him a .944 save percentage.
It was Dustin Wolf who drew his 3rd straight start for the Flames, getting tagged with the loss to drop his record to 3-4-1 in 8 starts. Wolf turned aside 28 out of the 32 shots on goal the Capitals had, recording a .875 save percentage.
Flames head coach Ryan Huska said after the game that "Five-on-5, I thought we did some things that we liked. I don't think we did a good enough job special team-wise. For me, that was the difference in the game. Both our power play in not generating anything for us, but also giving them momentum, and our penalty kill did that, too."
The Capitals get back in action when they welcome the Toronto Maple Leafs to town on Wednesday night, with Lindgren listed as the projected starter. Jacob Markstrom is the expected starter for the Flames against the Vancouver Canucks on Saturday.
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