T.J. Oshie’s sixth career hat trick carries Capitals past Blues

It went down as Aube-Kubel’s fifth goal of the season as Washington beat St. Louis, 5-2, at Capital One Arena on Thursday night. Goalie Charlie Lindgren, who spent the 2021-22 season in the Blues organization before joining the Capitals, made 17 saves to earn the victory. Jordan Binnington stopped 21 of 25 shots for St. Louis.

“Those help. Those help, to get that one,” Coach Spencer Carbery said. “I liked our game offensively. … I liked a lot of the [offensive] zone things that we did from getting things toward Binnington, getting it back, doing it again, throughout that game.”

Midway through, the Capitals have found a way to stay 'in the mix'

Fitting for a player whose goal song is “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” on a night when the theme of the game was country music, winger T.J. Oshie scored his first hat trick since Oct. 25, 2021. Oshie opened the scoring at 10:24 of the first period, added another in the second and hit the empty net with 20 seconds left to seal the victory. It’s the sixth hat trick of Oshie’s career and the fourth since he was traded to the Capitals from St. Louis in 2015.

For Oshie’s first goal, with Washington on the power play, winger Max Pacioretty intercepted a clearing attempt by the Blues in the neutral zone and made a heads-up pass to Oshie, who was waiting to reenter the offensive zone.

As Oshie gathered the puck onto his stick, defenseman Colton Parayko attempted to break up the play, but Oshie maintained control and cut to the slot before firing a wrist shot over Binnington’s shoulder.

A four-minute double-minor penalty to Hendrix Lapierre for high-sticking Blues defenseman Scott Perunovich quickly followed Oshie’s goal — and set the tone for a penalty-filled game. Each team had four power plays, and Washington killed all four of the Blues’ opportunities while scoring on two of its chances.

Shortly after Lapierre’s penalty expired, St. Louis drew even on a deflection by Nathan Walker. Walker was tied up with Capitals defenseman Ethan Bear at the front of the net, and Nick Leddy’s shot from the blue line deflected off the bottom of Walker’s stick and past Lindgren.

Aube-Kubel’s tally at 3:32 of the second period vaulted the Capitals back into the lead, and they didn’t look back. Oshie scored his second of the night midway through the frame, again combining with Pacioretty to create the goal.

This time, from his spot in the right circle, Pacioretty made a quick pass to center Dylan Strome, who was stationed along the goal line. Strome one-touched a pass back to Oshie in the bumper position between the circles, and Oshie was already in position to one-time the puck past Binnington. The Capitals’ power play hasn’t been seamless, but since Pacioretty joined the lineup in early January, the unit has started to create dangerous scoring chances on a consistent basis, and it took full advantage of those opportunities against the Blues.

“It’s always fun to be the guy that’s putting the puck in the net, but there’s a lot of credit that’s got to go to Stromer and Patch,” Oshie said. “There’s been an instant chemistry there and not just the goals, but there’s a lot of little plays that are making the game really easy on us because we’re working for each other and we’re supporting each other. We’re really just having a blast jumping over the boards together.”

The Capitals had to kill two penalties in the second half of the frame, which they did with minimal fuss. The second penalty ended four seconds early when Jake Neighbours was sent to the box for interference on Wilson at 18:30, which gave Washington 30 seconds of carry-over power-play time to begin the third period.

And when the final frame began, Alex Ovechkin — playing his first game since Jan. 11 after missing three with a lower-body injury — uncorked a trademark blast from the left circle. Binnington stopped the attempt, but the rebound kicked out to Strome for a tap-in finish, his team-leading 16th goal. The goal technically went in four seconds after the power play expired, but the new-look power play’s efforts created the tally, and it drove home their newfound effectiveness.

“Both [the power play and the penalty kill] were phenomenal tonight,” Carbery said. “The power play arguably scores three tonight. … Huge goals, huge moments. I just loved the process.”

Faulk scored from the right point to halve the Capitals’ lead at 4:01 of the third, but Washington had enough of a cushion to be in firm control down the stretch — a new feeling for a team that has had 21 of its 43 games decided by one goal.

Empty-net goals often bring a sense of relief, but when Oshie scored the empty-netter, the feeling inside the building — and on the Capitals’ bench — was celebratory after a well-worked victory.

“I feel like sometimes we get a lead and we kind of let our foot off the gas a little bit,” Strome said. “They got some chances, but I still feel like we had the majority of the play. We did a good job of not sitting back.”

Note: Defenseman Joel Edmundson is day-to-day with an upper-body injury and did not play against the Blues, which meant Trevor van Riemsdyk drew back into the lineup after being a healthy scratch Tuesday. Winger Beck Malenstyn missed the game for personal reasons.