Follow @james_tanner123 The Capitals beat the Leafs last night - barely.
With no one giving the Leafs a chance, they came out flying and if they could have taken advantage of two brutal periods by the Capitals, they would have won.
The Caps woke up for the third period and ended up winning, but it showed that the Leafs can and will win a game or two. This series won't be the cake-walk many expected.
Of course, those expecting an easy series don't seem to realize that a) the Leafs are really good, much better than your average eighth seed and b) a 70% favorite will still lose almost one in three times.
The Capitals - by all rights - probably should have lost last night. The Leafs came out flying and the Capitals made brutal giveaway after brutal giveaway. When they weren't giving the puck away like a free sample at Costco, they were icing the puck. There must have been 104 icings in the second period alone.
Fortunately for the Caps the Fedora King himself, Braden Holtby, came to play, even if no one else did. The Leafs could have put the game away during the first two periods but Holtby made multiple excellent saves to keep it close.
Eventually - after two fluke goals by Williams - the game was tied. Coach Dr. Robotnik must have reminded the Caps that they were the favorites during the second intermission because the Caps played much, much better in the third period.
Leafs goalie Andersen matched Holtby save for save. What the Capitals need to take from this game is that the nightmare scenario - being skated into the ground while Andersen plays up to Holtby's level - almost came to pass last night.
The Leafs most likely just learned that they can hold their own with the best and the series is only going to get tougher from here.
I watched about 70 Leafs games this year and that was the probably the least I ever noticed Auston Matthews all season - so he's going to be a factor going forward.
Overall, from a Washington perspective, they were probably lucky to escape this game with a victory. All three of their goals were lucky, they could have been down 4-0 after the first two periods and they'll have to play better going forward because the Leafs will definitely smell blood in the water after game one.
Then again, it's hard to imagine the Capitals playing this badly going forward. The Leafs won't be able to contain Ovechkin for long. Certainly the third period was a dominate one for them, and if they play like that then the Leafs will be toast.
Then again, the Leafs basically played this game without their best player (Matthews) and one of their best defenseman (Zaitsev). It will be interesting to see how this plays out.