Capitals vs. Hurricanes: Alex Tuch Scores Twice in His Washington Debut as the Caps Stun the Champs

Pierre-Luc Dubois went hunting behind the Carolina net, picked Brandon Bussi's pocket and flipped a backhand pass into the slot. Alex Tuch had an empty net and all the time in the world. Six and a half minutes into his first game as a Washington Capital, he had one of the easiest goals of his career, and the night only got better from there.

Washington beat the defending Stanley Cup champion Carolina Hurricanes 5-2 on Friday night at Lenovo Center, with Tuch scoring twice in his Capitals debut. Even the 41-year-old Alex Ovechkin got in on the fun, picking up an assist on the opener to start his 22nd NHL season. The Capitals scored three times in the first period and never let the champs get comfortable in their own building.

A First Period Straight Out of a Nightmare (for Carolina)

The Hurricanes never found their footing. After Tuch's opener at 6:33, assisted by Dubois and Ovechkin, Cole Hutson wired a short-side snap shot past Bussi at 11:33 off a feed from Ilya Protas. Then at 14:23, Tom Wilson's shot from above the left circle dribbled through Bussi, and Tuch was there to tap it in for his second of the night.

Three goals, one period, and a Carolina team that looked nothing like a champion. "We were still getting outplayed a ton," Hurricanes captain Jordan Staal said. "The stress was on us a lot more than we wanted, and it showed."

It got worse before it got better. Charles Alexis Legault's slashing minor 69 seconds into the second gave Washington a power play, and Jakob Chychrun needed only 27 seconds of it, firing from just inside the blue line at 1:36 for a 4-0 lead.

The Turning Point: Eight Seconds That Killed the Comeback

Carolina finally broke through on a power play at 16:50 of the second, when Sebastian Aho finished an Andrei Svechnikov feed to make it 4-1. For about eight seconds, there was a pulse in the building.

Then Ryan Leonard took it away. On the very next shift, Leonard drove to the back door on a 2-on-1, and Dylan Strome put the puck right on his stick for a redirect at 16:58. Leonard explained the mindset. "Whenever you're the next line up the shift after a goal, you're trying to do something to gain some positive momentum," he said.

Logan Stankoven tipped a K'Andre Miller shot at 10:50 of the third to make it 5-2, but that was as close as Carolina got. Things got testy late, with roughing and cross-checking calls and a misconduct to Legault at 19:18, but the outcome had long been settled.

Tuch Arrives, the Penalty Kill Delivers

Tuch finished with two goals and a plus-2 in 16:38. According to NHL.com, he became the fifth Capitals player to score twice in his team debut, joining Mikhail Grabovski, Scott Walker, Ovechkin and Brian Bellows. The 30-year-old came over from Buffalo in a June sign-and-trade and was quick to share the credit for the opener. "Great play by 'Dubie' on the forecheck there," Tuch said. He did not oversell the finish, either. "First couple shifts, you're a little nervous. Keep it simple. Getting that first one, definitely a good feeling, obviously an empty net. That's a nice treat," he said.

Dubois and Strome each had two assists, Chychrun scored and set up Leonard's goal, and Hutson added a goal to go with two blocked shots.

Logan Thompson was excellent, stopping 31 of 33 shots for a .939 save percentage. NHL.com noted that the win moved him past Jose Theodore into ninth place on the franchise's all-time wins list with 63. He gave the credit to his penalty killers, and the numbers back him up: Carolina went 1-for-6 on the power play. "Credit to the PKers," Thompson said. "That PK unit was huge tonight."

The other hidden hero was the shot-blocking. Washington blocked 28 shots to Carolina's nine, an absurd gap that explains how the Hurricanes could outshoot the Capitals 33-27 and still look toothless.

For Carolina, Bussi made 22 saves on 27 shots for an .815 save percentage. Aho scored his first goal of the season, and Stankoven got his first as well. Head coach Rod Brind'Amour did not bother with silver linings. "There's not a lot of positives out of that game," he said. "The start was not good. You get behind the 8-ball with kind of a freebie. You can't give good teams free goals. I thought we gave two of those up tonight."

Stats That Matter

• 28-9: Washington's edge in blocked shots, the defining number of the night.
• 5-for-6: Washington's penalty kill against the champs.
• 3: First-period goals for the Capitals, two of them from Tuch.
• 8 seconds: The gap between Aho's power-play goal and Leonard's answer.
• 32-19: Carolina's edge in hits. Physical, yes. Effective, no.

What It Means

Washington is 1-0-0 after its season opener and heads to Tampa Bay on Saturday for the second half of a back-to-back. Coach Spencer Carbery loved the tone. "Right from puck drop, we liked a lot of the things we were doing early in the game. I thought we were handling their pressure," he said.

Carolina falls to 0-1-1 after opening Tuesday with a 1-0 overtime loss at home to Florida. Two games in, the champions have scored two goals, and both came in this one. Stankoven pointed to the slow start. "But as we know, you can't take a period and a half off," he said. Brind'Amour put it plainly. "We have a couple guys who need to get their game up. When we've got 20 guys rolling, we're a good team. When we don't, it's too hard," he said. The Hurricanes travel to Philadelphia on Saturday.

Fast and Furious, Installment 22

Ovechkin at 41, starting his 22nd season with an assist on a goal by the new guy, is the hockey version of the Fast and Furious franchise: everyone keeps expecting the final chapter, and it keeps getting renewed. This time, Tuch got the starring role.

Stats from the official box score via ESPN. Game details from the Associated Press; postgame quotes and team notes as reported by NHL.com.