Alex Ovechkin tried to force his way between two Penguins, one of whom happened to be Sidney Crosby. The opening was minimal, a high-risk play. Crosby poked the puck away, retrieved it and skated in for an easy breakaway goal.
It was far from one player committing these hockey sins. But it’s the sort of play the Capitals must curb in next year’s playoffs, unless they want more Game 7 misery.
“The areas we struggled in the most was turning the puck over and odd-man rushes,” said Caps defenseman Brian Pothier. “Those plagued us every game almost. We had one game against the Rangers where we were really air tight. We had stretches [against Pittsburgh] as well. But not for an entire game where we were just locked in and played real good simple hockey. We were trying to do too much.
“Every time we touched the puck you’re feeling like you have to score a goal. That gets you nowhere pretty quick. That works in the regular season, but not in the postseason.”
Youth is one culprit: four key players in this series — Ovechkin, Mike Green, Nicklas Backstrom and Simeon Varlamov — are 23 years or younger. Another seven are between 24 and 26.
“We’re a young team and we want to play with the puck,” forward Tomas Fleischmann, 24, said, “and do a lot of things by ourselves and make plays on the blue line and you get bad turnovers. Teams like Pittsburgh were waiting for that and they strike on things like that.”
