EditorsNote: rewords fifth and sixth grafs
Alex Ovechkin was one of five Capitals who scored a goal as Washington defeated the visiting Anaheim Ducks 5-2 Monday night.
Richard Panik, Chandler Stephenson, Jakub Vrana and Tom Wilson also each scored a goal as Washington came up with at least one in each of the three periods.
Goalie Braden Holtby made 32 saves and improved to 10-0-1 in his past 11 starts. He has won seven in a row.
The Capitals now are 13-1-2 in their past 16 games, and they improved to 7-1-1 in the month of November. Also, they've won two in a row since losing to Montreal at home on Friday, the team's lone loss this month.
Panik gave Washington an early lead with his first goal as a member of the Capitals -- and it came 50 seconds into the contest.
He took a quick pass from Travis Boyd and fired a high shot past goalie John Gibson from the left circle.
The Caps took control with two goals in the second period, from Ovechkin and Stephenson, for a 3-0 lead. Ovechkin's goal came on a power play at 6:39 of the period from the left circle.
Evgeny Kuznetsov set up the play by threading a perfect pass to Ovechkin through traffic from the right side.
Washington made it 3-0 on the Stephenson goal with 34 seconds left in the second period. He took a pass from Garnet Hathaway and beat Gibson from between the circles.
After making the pass, Hathaway then jumped into a brawl that took the officials several minutes to control and figure out. He came away with a match penalty as seven penalties were handed out overall. There even was some question about if the goal would stand up, but eventually it did.
Vrana scored his goal in the third period before Sam Steel and Nicolas Deslauriers got goals for the Ducks that cut the margin to 4-2. Wilson's empty-net goal locked it up for Washington with 1:11 remaining.
--Field Level Media
