Clamp down, finish fast as Washington buries Seattle 4-1

This one looked grown up, start to finish. Nic Dowd opened the scoring off a slick John Carlson touch, a fourth line reward after consecutive heavy forecheck shifts that pinned Seattle deep.

Leonard doubled the edge with a bar down rip that popped the building. The rookie found the dot lane off a clean entry, settled his feet, and wired it past Matt Murray, a release that keeps surprising defenders.

Jakob Chychrun added the cushion on a power play snapper. Washington worked through the bumper twice, tugged the box apart, then fed Chychrun in stride for a quick, heavy finish from the left side.

The details stacked up away from the goals. Washington denied the middle, killed entries early, and lived on low to high touches that turned Seattle shifts into long clears and tired legs. Shots tilted 35 to 17, and it felt like more.

Jaden Schwartz finally broke the seal on a fortunate bounce, but the structure held. Tom Wilson salted it with an empty netter, and the bench exhaled on a night that never really slipped.

As a fan and an analyst, this is the template, layers in five on five, quick exits, and a goalie who eats the first shot without drama.

Thompson stopped 16 of 17 and did the simple things right, stick sets on rims, square on point wristers, no second bites. That steadiness let Washington roll four lines, win shifts, and avoid chasing a track meet.

Credit the Dowd unit for tone setting. Brandon Duhaime drove entries with speed, Carlson jumped as the late wave, and Dowd finished from the weak side post, exactly the pattern Spencer Carbery has been asking to see.

Tactically, the Caps owned the walls. First touch support stayed tight, the weak side winger sprinted the dot lane, and Seattle spent whole minutes flipping pucks out rather than carrying cleanly through the neutral zone.

On special teams, the penalty kill stayed compact and active up ice, chopping twenty seconds off each Seattle try before the zone set. When Washington earned its chance, puck speed beat stick position, and Chychrun cashed.

The numbers echo the eye test. Washington controlled expected goals through forty minutes, limited high danger to scraps, and forced the Kraken into twenty blocks, a sign of sustained zone time and layered looks.

Now the focus flips to Friday in Columbus, where the same habits travel if exits stay crisp and the top six keeps driving inside ice. Bank nights like this, and the record grows without needing hero shifts.