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Monday, Dec. 27 7:00pm ET
Gilmour pulls 'Hawks even in third | |||||
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BOX SCORE
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Washington Capitals didn't talk about it much. Coach Ron Wilson didn't even bring it up. But, deep down, they really wanted to beat the Chicago Blackhawks and, in a small way, defend the honor of their general manager. Instead, in Monday night's first meeting between the teams since a postgame locker-room fight in September, the Caps had to settle for a 2-2 tie. "You don't want to show them how tough you are," Capitals right wing Peter Bondra said. "You want to beat them and show them, 'Hey, we've got a better team.' So we didn't really talk about it or do anything special -- we go into the game and want to win the game, that's how we punish the other team." So, in a rematch that wasn't any more physical than most NHL games, the deciding goal came from Chicago's Doug Gilmour with 6:55 to play. It was his 12th of the season, capping a 3-on-2 break with Alexei Zhamnov and Tony Amonte. Michael Nylander also scored for the Blackhawks, who had won three of five. Chris Simon and James Black scored for the Capitals, who had lost three straight. The team also welcomed back leading scorer Bondra after an eight-game absence with a knee injury. At an exhibition game in Columbus, Ohio, on Sept. 25, Capitals GM George McPhee was upset that Chicago used a lineup of enforcers. After the game, McPhee approached Chicago head coach -- now assistant coach -- Lorne Molleken for an explanation.A fight ensued, and McPhee wound up with a broken right thumb and Molleken got a black eye. The NHL fined McPhee $20,000 and suspended him for the month of October. McPhee and Molleken, who have not spoken since the fracas, played down the incident Monday. "It's clear from the way they're playing that all that stuff is over," McPhee said during the second intermission. Said Molleken: "That situation is over and done with. That's the way our hockey team plays. ... You've got two hockey teams battling for their lives out there." Some of the players felt otherwise. "Nobody talked about what happened, but I'm sure a lot of people were thinking about it in their heads," said Chicago goaltender Jocelyn Thibault, whose 32 saves included a tough stop against Black in overtime. "I think it was a very intense and very physical game." Black gave the Capitals a 2-1 lead with 10:51 to play. After a sequence in which no Capitals player seem to want to shoot, Black nailed a rocket from the far edge of the right circle for his seventh goal. Nylander gave the Blackhawks a 1-0 lead 4:18 into the second period off a feed from Steve Sullivan on a 2-on-1 break. Nylander has 12 points in his last 11 games. Simon tied the score in a mad scramble in front of the goal at 17:43 of the second period. Steve Konowalchuck came around the net and stuffed the puck into the crease, and Simon chipped the third rebound over Thibault's shoulder for his eighth goal. The game drew 16,017 fans, the largest crowd since the home opener, perhaps in anticipation of a sequel to September's unfriendly encounter. "I think everyone figured out it was going to be a pretty hard game," Washington center Jeff Halpern said. "It was a lot of fun out there. The crowd was into it, they obviously came to see the second part." Before the game, Capitals center Adam Oates was presented with a silver hockey stick in recognition of his 1,000th NHL game, which came on the road last week at Vancouver. | ALSO SEE NHL Scoreboard Chicago Clubhouse Washington Clubhouse RECAPS Philadelphia 5 Calgary 1
Chicago 2
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