The New York Rangers and Washington Capitals meet for Game 3 and Game 4 of the eastern conference second round NHL playoffs series this week and the Verizon Center hosts and the games will be on TV from the NBC Sports Network and NBCSN Live extra website and comes as the series is tied 1-1 and will be starting on Monday and Wednesday at 7:30 pm ET for Alex Ovechkin and Henrik Lundqvist.
The Caps won Game 1 in stunning fashion after a great play from Ovechkin, who fed Joel Ward the pass before scoring the winner with one second left. The Rangers jumped back and won Game 2 after starting off fast and finishing strong, taking the game 3-2 after losing the forest matchup in a heartbreaker. Chris Kreider scored 30 seconds into the game and Derick Brassard had a huge goal for the team.
The Rangers needed the win badly and they came through, forcing three penalties for the Caps in the first period and scoring on one of the power plays. The team did not want to go into Game 3 down 2-0 and now the series is tied 1-1 heading into DC. The team got a goal on the power play from Dan Boyle and after Evgeny Kuznetsov scored, the Rangers were able to come back in the third.
Things were 2-1 when Brassard was called for a penalty and as the Rangers killed it, Brassard went hard to the net on Braden Holtby. Holtby was singlehandedly keeping his team in the game and after two fantastic touches from Martin St. Louis and Rick Nash, Brassard buried the goal through the five hole. Brassard had been stopped multiple times with good chances on Holtby after trying to get fancy in front of the net and this time he said he tried something different: shooting right away and clearly it worked.
The game was not close to being over through, as the Rangers had a 3-1 lead heading into the final stretch of 11 minutes, but that is when the great Alex Ovechkin did his work. Ovi had scored a great goal in game 1 and he added another fantastic one in Game 2. Ovechkin showed his strength, as he came down into the offensive zone, barreled through Dan Girardi and Ryan McDonagh, the best defensemen for the Rangers, lined up for a shot and beat Henrik Lundqvist to the wide side, cutting the deficit to one.
The Rangers outlasted a flurry of shots at the end, with Hank making a couple amazing saves and the series now is tried 1-1. The team now has the chance to take back home ice and Girardi said that the flurry at the end was wild, saying it felt like the Caps had "10 guys" on the ice.
Check here for the New York Rangers and Washington Capitals live coverage.