NHL | Washington – Tampa Bay 4: 3, Rutta passed, but the defending champions lost again

Washington led in the 8th minute with goals from defenders Martin Fehérváry and Carlson. Nikita Kučerov soon reduced his goal, who later scored a goal for Ondřej Palát, but the referees did not recognize the goal due to a pass. The Czech forward has been waiting for a shooting record since January 12, when he was injured. After returning, he recorded only seven passes in 26 matches.

The home team bounced back with Ovečkin and in 81 seconds Nick Paul scored a contact goal from the ring after the action of Rutta, who moved the puck to the attacking blue line to Steven Stamkos in the middle zone. The Czech back, who scored last year against Toronto, improved their balance to 3 + 13 in the season.

Carlson increased in the 37th minute in a power play and scored a total of three times in the match, but one goal was canceled at the end of the opening period at 3: 2 after a coaching challenge due to offside. “It would be great, I haven’t given a hat-trick yet,” said Carlson, who had experienced a four-point night for the third time in his career. “We’ve been losing a lot lately and we’ve had to catch up with our opponents. That’s why we emphasized that we wanted to start well. We did well and we also did power play,” he said contentedly.

Tampa Bay dramatized the match with a shot by Ross Colton in a game without a goalkeeper. Palát could still equalize, but he did not beat Ilya Samsonov, who took precedence over Vítek Vaněček in goal. The Czech goalkeeper is going through a worse period – from the last five starts he scored four defeats and collected a total of 19 goals.

Detroit won 3: 1 in Winnipeg thanks to two goals by Sam Gagner, who opened in the scoring in the 19th minute and sealed the win in a home team-free game. The only goal of the Jets was scored by Mark Scheifele, and Blake Wheeler still scored halfway through the match, but the referees took his shot back after the coach’s call for offside. At 1: 1, Jakub Vrána hit the post in the second period. The match was decided by Michael Rasmussen’s goal from the 50th minute.

Winnipeg missed the chance to reduce the loss to the last place in the playoffs at the Western Conference. His deficit at eighth Dallas remained at seven points.

“We can’t afford to lose and we shouldn’t have lost this match. Given our situation and the fact that they played the second match on the second day, it’s frustrating how it turned out,” said Winnipeg defender Josh Morrissey. “We didn’t deserve to lose after the first period. But we missed our chances, let them breathe and they caught on,” added coach Dave Lowry.

The situation is also complicated by the Vegas team, which lost 1: 5 to Vancouver at home and are losing a point to Dallas. The Golden Knights led, but collected twice in 17 seconds in the 17th minute. Elias Pettersson contributed four points (2 + 2) to the turnover. “We were terrible in everything,” lamented coach Peter DeBoer. Vegas, which joined the NHL in 2017, lost to Vancouver for the first time in club history.

Daniel Vladař covered the back of Jacob Markström, who caught 26 shots in Anaheim and was declared the first star in the Calgary 4: 2 victory. He was employed in three attempts by Dominik Simon, who had not yet scored in his new job after the exchange from Pittsburgh.