Caps open road trip with same scoring struggles, lose to league-worst Sharks

SAN JOSE — The Washington Capitals were centimeters, if not millimeters, away from scoring the first goal of the game.

On the power play early in the first period Monday night against the San Jose Sharks, winger Tom Wilson received a pass from captain Alex Ovechkin on the edge of the crease. Wilson didn’t get a clean shot the first time, but he maintained possession and tried to poke the puck under the pad of San Jose goalie Mackenzie Blackwood. The puck slipped under Blackwood’s pad, but before it could cross the goal line, it was swept away by Matt Benning to nullify the near-goal.

The early narrow miss set the tone for a frustrating night at SAP Center for the Capitals as they lost to the bottom-dwelling Sharks, 2-1, in the first game of a five-game road trip. After a 5-0 loss to Edmonton on Friday, Washington has scored just one goal in its past two games.

“I felt like we did a lot of good things,” Wilson said. “A couple pucks that go their way I think is probably our game. It’s tough to swallow when you feel like you played probably good enough to win, but we’ve got to find a way to get it done.”

Not being able to execute on the final play became a theme for Washington all night long. Despite outshooting San Jose, 34-23, and generating 60 shot attempts to the Sharks’ 52, the Capitals could only beat Blackwood (33 saves) once.

Moments before Wilson’s close chance, Ovechkin rang the post with one of his trademark one-timers from the left circle — close, but not close enough, to putting the Capitals into the lead. Instead, the Sharks pulled ahead midway through the frame on a goal from Fabian Zetterlund, who caused problems for the Capitals with his speed throughout the night.

The sequence started with defenseman Nick Jensen activating deep into the offensive zone, which put the Capitals in a vulnerable defensive position when the puck turned over; center Dylan Strome had to backtrack alongside defenseman Joel Edmundson to defend the rush opportunity. Zetterlund skirted past Strome to fire the initial shot from the right circle, and though Darcy Kuemper stopped him the first time, when a rebound came to Zetterlund seconds later, he fired it into the top corner of the net.

San Jose’s skating ability created issues for Washington both offensively and defensively. When the Sharks had the puck, they were able to skate directly at the Capitals’ defensemen, often getting past them for dangerous scoring chances. And when Washington was in possession, their promising opportunities were quickly snuffed out by San Jose’s swift skaters, arriving with plenty of time to cut off a passing lane or take the puck away.

“Did a lot of good things, but just felt a little bit eerily similar to the start of the year,” Capitals Coach Spencer Carbery said. “We’re just not able to make that last play and find that last goal to be able to break through and score maybe three or four in a game. ... It makes it tough to win the games, scoring one goal.”

It wasn’t until late in the second period that the Capitals were able to create extended sequences of possession in the offensive zone. When they did, Blackwood was up to the challenge, and it took a unique deflection for Washington to finally break through. Evgeny Kuznetsov’s shot from the top of the left circle bounced off Blackwood’s pad, hit Nikita Okhotiuk in front of the net and sailed past Blackwood to even the score.

Despite three opportunities on the power play, the Capitals extended their drought to 33 consecutive power plays without a goal. At times this season, the power play has suffered from a low winning percentage on faceoffs and an inability to enter the zone with possession, preventing them from getting set up in their structure, but there’s also been a dose of bad luck involved in the slump. Washington had minimal issues getting into the positions Carbery and assistant coach Kirk Muller want on the power play, but several shots off the post and a handful of saves by Blackwood kept them from being able to capitalize.

“[Blackwood] played well tonight,” forward Connor McMichael said. “But at the end of the day, it’s on us.”

Carbery said he felt like a broken record as he dissected Washington’s issues after the game. In many ways, Monday’s game bore similarities to the Capitals’ early-season difficulties, when no matter how many chances they created or how much puck possession they had, they couldn’t put the puck in the back of the net.

“We’ll look at all the different shots and traffic and rebounds, like, what can we do better to make [it hard on] goaltenders? I feel like I’ve talked about this ad nauseam,” Carbery said. “We leave games and we’re like, ‘Mackenzie Blackwood, again, made a bunch of good saves.’ We have to just find a way to break through. Just for whatever reason, we haven’t hit our stride offensively. No one in our lineup or in our top six are really clicking to be able to finish. It’s tough to win in this league when you don’t make that last play.”

There have been brief moments of offensive success this season, but for the most part, Washington has yet to find its game offensively. Through 18 games, the Capitals are averaging just 2.33 goals per game, 31st in the NHL, and their 42 total goals also rank 31st.

The one team below them in both categories? The San Jose Sharks.