The Boston Bruins really hated playing the Capitals this season, and they especially hated playing against Braden Holtby.
For the third time this season Holtby stonewalled the Bruins, stopping all 27 shots he faced en route to his league leading 9th shut out (tied with Price and Fleury) and 41st win. Holtby made his 71st appearance this year which is tops in the league.
The Capitals played a hard game, but were, at times, very sloppy, giving up odd-man breaks to the Bruins. However, Holtby stood tall and gave the Boston players absolutely nothing to shoot at.
In three games against the Bruins this season, Holtby has stopped all 88 shots he has faced marking the first time in franchise history that a goaltender has blanked the Bruins in a season series.
The Caps got goals from John Carlson, Matt Niskanen and Marcus Johansson, while firing 33 shots on Bruins goaltender Tuuka Rask. Nicklas Backstrom had 2 assists.
One of the other highlights of the night was Johansson's goal, his 20th of the season. Evgeny Kuznetsov made an unbelievable play behind the net, feeding the puck out front to Johansson for the easy tap in. It marked the first 20 goal season for Johansson.
"It's a milestone to get." Johansson said. "Barry wants me to score more, and it's fun when you do it, so I don't mind it. It was an unbelievable play... Scoring goals is fun, but most importantly we won the game, and we kept going."
Washington now sits in second place in the Metro with 101 points, three better than the Islanders. If the Caps can hold off the Rangers on Saturday and the Islanders win only one of their last two games, Washington will have home-ice advantage.
The Islanders play the Penguins tonight in a must win for both teams. The Penguins are in danger of missing the playoffs altogether as the Bruins and Senators are creeping up the standings.
more to come...