OTTAWA - The city changed, but the troubling story remained the same.  Monday night, for the third straight game against a Canadian team, the Washington Capitals jumped to an early lead only to relax and let their opponent come back to tie, and eventually win the game.

 

Monday it was in Ottawa against the Senators, and a 3-1 lead that turned into a 4-3 overtime defeat, but the facts aren’t nearly as telling as the words of Capitals Head Coach Bruce Boudreau.
 
“This was a total collapse by 20 guys.  I don’t know how else to sugarcoat it.  We had total control of the game after two periods.  They didn’t even want to be part of it.  They looked like they wanted to go home,” exclaimed a visibly frustrated Boudreau after the game.
 
The loss marred a celebratory night for Washington’s Jay Beagle, who scored his first career NHL goal in the second period to give the Caps a 3-1 lead.  Chris Clark and Brendan Morrison also scored for Washington, and Semyon Varlamov made 33 saves in defeat.
 
Things did not start in favor of the Capitals, playing in their third game in four nights, when Ottawa’s Peter Regin deflected a shot from the point by teammate Jesse Winchester past Varlamov 7:27 into the first period.
 
After Regin’s strike, however, the game turned decidedly in Washington’s favor.  Clark tied the game up four minutes later on a disputed goal.  As Washington broke into the offensive zone, Alexander Ovechkin swung a pass from the left boards to Brian Pothier streaking into the center of the zone.
 
Pothier wound up for a slap shot but instead powered the puck to Clark at the left post, tricking everyone on the ice, including Clark.  Washington’s captain reached his skate out in what he later called an attempt to control the puck in his feet, and instead redirected it into the net past Ottawa backup netminder Brian Elliott.
 
The play was sent to the NHL’s video replay command center in Toronto, which sent back word a few minutes later that it was a legal goal.  NHL rules disallow any goal scored with a “distinct kicking motion,” but do allow a player to intentionally redirect the puck in the net with his skate.
 
Head Coach Cory Clouson and the Senators were clearly upset by the call, and the Capitals added to their frustration in the dying seconds of the period when Morrison scored to give Washington a lead for the 24th time in 24 games.
 
A defensive breakdown by the Senators in their own zone allowed Morrison to sneak free of his defender and slide to the left post, where he had a gaping net after Mike Green one-timed a pass from Eric Fehr to him.
 
Beagle’s unassisted goal midway through the second period, a nifty snap shot over Elliott’s blocker after the Senators’ Jonathan Cheechoo made an ill-advised clearing pass in front of the Ottawa net, lifted the Capitals to a 3-1 lead and seemed to suck the life out of the home team.
 
However, just as they did two nights prior in Toronto, the Caps took their foot off the gas pedal and let the home team back in the game.  The Capitals recorded 28 shots in the game, and the count by period is telling.  Washington took 15 shots in the first period, 10 in the second, only three in the third, and none in 74 seconds of the eventual overtime.
 
Ottawa, meanwhile, peppered Varlamov with 18 shots in the third frame as Washington was unable to clear the puck out of their zone and unable to clear Senators players from in front of Varlamov’s net.
 
Chris Neil, more familiar as a pugilist than a scorer, started Ottawa’s comeback just 3:18 into the first period.  David Steckel’s clearing attempt was intercepted at the Capitals blue line by Filip Kuba, who blasted a waist-high shot on net that was tipped down and between Varlamov’s legs by Neil.
 
Four minutes later the Senators pulled even on yet another shot from the point, and with Ovechkin in the penalty box for a roughing minor that the superstar felt was questionable at best.  Washington was unable to clear the zone and the Senators cycled the puck along the board and behind the net to Kuba, who set up Alexandre Picard for a perfect one-timer.  Varlamov was screened by Milan Michalek and barely flinched on the shot.
 
Neither team was able to dent the twine again in the third frame, and so the game headed to overtime.
 
It was a familiar scenario for the Caps and Clark, who also took a penalty late in the period that Washington successfully killed.  “We've shot ourselves in the foot a number of times this year, but we came out in overtime and won games. But this is the one that really hurts because we lost.”
 
Clark also claimed that his team did not take overtime lightly, but apparently that memo never reached Green, who committed a pair of egregious turnovers in the neutral zone (though curiously, the official scoresheet listed him with 0 giveaways for the game) that eventually led to Washington’s defeat.
 
First Green whiffed on the puck at Otttawa’s blue line, sending Daniel Alfredsson and Jason Spezza on a two-on-one against Jeff Schultz.  Alfredsson dished to Spezza for a point-blank one-timer at the bottom of the left circle that Varlamov somehow turned away.
 
Twelve seconds later, Green missed a poke check at center ice that sprang Chris Phillips and Mike Fisher on another odd-man rush.  Fisher tapped Phillips’ centering pass out of midair past Varlamov’s glove to earn Ottawa the unlikely victory
 
NOTES

-For Monday’s game Washington had seven players – Milan Jurcina (back), Shaone Morrisonn (concussion), Tom Poti (chest), Boyd Gordon (back), Mike Knuble (finger), Alexander Semin (wrist), and Quintin Laing (jaw) – listed on injured reserve or long-term injured reserve.  Morrisonn was the only player to travel to Canada with the team, and appears to be closest to returning.

-Ottawa was without a backup goaltender for the second half of the game, as an errant dump-in from center ice sailed into the bench and struck Pascal Leclaire in the face.  Leclaire, the Senators usual starter who was taking a game off because of a lower body injury, was rumored to have suffered a broken jaw but the team did not confirm any specifics of his injury.