Fleischmann Saves Caps in Overtime

By: Justin Creech
Washington, DC—Tomas Fleischmann was greeted by a group of Priests in the Capitals locker room after last night’s game against the Carolina Hurricanes. Thankfully for Fleischmann, and the Capitals, they did were not in the locker room to forgive Fleischmann for his sins.
Fleischmann scored the game winning goal 3:20 into overtime on a beautiful pass from Eric Belanger to give the Capitals a thrilling 4-3 win in front of 18, 277 at Verizon Center and extend the Capitals regulation home unbeaten streak to 15 games.
“I just jumped from the bench, [Belanger] make the pass,” said a pleased Fleischmann. “I didn’t have it all the way, but it went in, so I’m happy.”
After a transition in the neutral zone, Belanger skated into the Hurricanes’ zone and sent a pass to Fleischmann that Fleischmann easily put into the net. The goal was Fleischmann’s 19th of the season and his first since before the Olympic break.
Fleischmann, who was a healthy scratch Monday night against the Dallas Stars, said he had a specific message for Coach Bruce Boudreau.
“Don’t sit me out again,” said Fleischmann.
The remark drew a laugh from Boudreau in the post game press conference, but Boudreau did say that he knows how Fleischmann feels.
“He’s a good player and if the circumstances weren’t what they are he wouldn’t be sitting out,” said Boudreau. “But, it’s only march 10, and if we started playing everybody and somebody got hurt the first game of the playoffs that’s 30 days before a guys played. It’s not fair to that player, and it’s not fair to the team. I don’t like doing it either, but as long as we can we are going to keep rotating guys in and out of the lineup.”
The assist was Belanger’s second point in the last three games after scoring a goal in the second period of Saturday’s game against the New York Rangers, prompting Belanger to say he is feeling more comfortable each game.
“I’m feeling good,” said Belanger.”I’m playing with some confidence and I’m playing with good players. There’s still a little bit of the system that I need to get under my feet, but it’s going better and better every game.”
Mike Green and Alexander Semin also scored for the Capitals with Green finishing with two tallies. Both came on the power play, one in the first and one in the second, as the Capitals registered their first multi power play goal game since Feb. 13 against the St. Louis Blues. It was also Green’s first multi goal game since Jan. 12 in Tampa Bay.
Though Green was fantastic on the power play, he was equally ineffective in the Capitals defensive zone.
With the Capitals holding a 2-1 lead, Green’s errant clearing attempt was intercepted by Patrick Dwyer along the far boards and sent to Tuomo Ruutu who was open in the high slot. Ruutu’s shot beat Capitals netminder Jose Theodore to tie the game at 8:43.
“He got two goals and one beautiful assist, but the assist was to the wrong team,” said Boudreau. “His idea was right but he was being too casual and trying to finesse the puck in there.”
Semin got the Capitals on the board 2:24 in to the game after taking a pass from Brenden Morrison at the Carolina blue line. Semin raced to the net, cut in front of Hurricanes’ defensemen Jay Harrson and beat Manny Legace with a beautiful backhand shot to the blocker side for a 1-0 lead.
Green stretched the lead to 2-0 at 17:59 on a shot from the middle of the left circle that beat Legace five-hole.
That’s when things got interesting. Just 18 seconds later, Dwyer batted the puck past Theodore with the puck in mid-air after Theodore had stopped Tom Kostpoulos’s shot from the point.
Ruutu tallied to tie the game, then after Green put the Capitals back in the lead with his second power play goal at 11:02, Jussi Jokinen tied the game once again with a wrist shot from the high slot that beat Theodore to his glove side at 15:03 of the second period.
It was the third time in four games the Capitals have surrendered a two goal lead.
“We try, but we’ve got to learn it,” said Fleischmann of the Capitals defensive lapses. “If we pay more attention to the defense they wouldn’t have scored those goals.”