Capitals Poised To Steal The Eastern Conference From Flyers

The first-place Philadelphia Flyers lost in a shootout to the second-place Washington Capitals last night.  Philly took a late in the 3rd in what appeared to be an early ending to the game, but Washington's Marcus Johansson knotted the game up with only 3:19 to go, and Alexander Semin won the game in the shootout.

Washington's Mike Knuble scores in the 1st period of play

But what happened?  Philadelphia's goaltending was practically non-existent for the first period, with Nicklas Backstrom's early goal appearing to have been scored by accident. In fact, Washington took only seven shots on goal in the first period, but scored two goals.  And with the third unanswered goal, Sergei Bobrovski's save percentage for the game was .667%.  His save percentage for the season is .914%.  Both of the Flyers goalies played terrible.  And by the way, Washington was without star winger Alexander Ovechkin for this game.

Philidelphia's Claude Giroux's attempt to tie after Alexander Semin's goal

With this win, Washington will clinch the Southeast Division, and if the Flyers lose Thursday night and the Caps win Friday night, there'll be a new leader in the Eastern Conference.

Alexander Semin's game-winning shootout goal for Washington

An aerial-view of the same goal