Lethargic-looking Thrashers lose to Caps

Washington — The stirring hockey the Thrashers played Tuesday night in Toronto took too long to make it through customs when they returned to the United States.

By the time the Thrashers started playing with any hint of energy Wednesday night, Alexander Ovechkin already had a hat trick, and the Capitals were well on their way to a 5-3 victory.

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AP

Teammates congratulate Thrasher Slava Kozlov after his shot past Capitals goalie Jose Theodore made the score 4-2.

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Ovechkin’s three goals on three shots came in less than 21 minutes. In the meantime, the Thrashers combined for only four shots, which equaled their number of penalties.

They were late to the puck and late delivering hits, and they seemed to pay no more defensive attention to Ovechkin than to the four players the injury-depleted Capitals called up for this game from their minor-league affiliate in Hershey. Ovechkin had no shortage of space to work and used it well, as you might expect from the only player who has scored more NHL goals the past four seasons than the Thrashers’ Ilya Kovalchuk.

How did Ovechkin get so open?

“There’s probably 29 other teams wondering the same thing,” Thrashers coach John Anderson said, and then he pointed out that two of the goals on Ovechkin’s sixth career hat trick came on the power play. “In the power play, you can’t just put one guy on him. Then you’re 4 on 3. You try to take away as much as possible. He’s a superstar. He’s somebody you’ve got to watch all the time. But there’s a reason he scores 50 or 60 [goals a season].”

Ovechkin wound up with a four-point night, thanks to a third-period assist, and the Thrashers wound up with their first loss in regulation in seven games within the Southeast Division.

They had played arguably their best game of the season the night before in a 6-3 victory at Toronto, but the energy and aggressiveness they showed throughout that game made only a brief second-period appearance on Wednesday.

“We had some spurts where we were taking it to them, but for the most part they outplayed us the whole game,” Thrashers forward Colby Armstrong said. “It was just one of those nights on the back-to-back where we just didn’t come out and have the jump we’d like to. It’s disappointing.”

The division-leading Capitals, even without seven starters, still played an in-your-face kind of game that exposed the Thrashers’ lethargy.

“If we’re not ready to move our feet, pay the price and make some little plays, they have guys that can jump on you,” Armstrong said.

The Thrashers dropped nine points out of the Southeast lead as they passed the quarter-way point of the season schedule. Their two pieces of consolation: defenseman Ron Hainsey was able to return after limping to the locker room with what looked like an ankle injury early in the second period, and defenseman Nathan Oystrick scored his first NHL goal, one night after picking up his first NHL assist. Bryan Little and Slava Kozlov scored power-play goals, both with assists from Kovalchuk.

The Capitals got goals from Eric Fehr and Viktor Kozlov, but the reason they snapped their three-game losing streak was Ovechkin.

“It was a great start for us, especially after the bad [1-3-1] trip and the losing,” he said. “We lost three in a row, and we just had to come back to our building and win the game.”