Capitals Make a Point to Islanders

Even though the Washington Capitals are in command in the Patrick Division, they and a lot of other people didn’t quite seem to believe it.

The Capitals proved it is no fluke over the weekend with a two-game sweep of the New York Islanders, capped by a 5-2 victory Sunday in Landover, Md.

“We really felt this weekend was important from a confidence standpoint,” Washington Coach Brian Murray said. “You couldn’t write a better script for this game, to get ahead, have them tie it up, and then come back and win it like we did.”

Washington increased its lead to seven points over Philadelphia and 15 over the third-place Islanders, who saw its hopes for the division title just about vanish.

To do it, the Capitals had to regroup in the third period after the Islanders rallied from a two-goal deficit to tie the score on goals by Mike Bossy and Pat Flatley.

“Our coming back like that after seeing a lead evaporate like it did made these two games as important as the victories,” Mike Gartner said. “In addition to taking away the momentum we built up while we were sitting on the lead, by winning these two games we proved to ourselves that we can beat a good team. It gave us a big lift psychologically.”

Gartner took passes from Bob Carpenter to score his 30th and 31st of goals midway through the third period, putting the Capitals back in charge and on their way to a seventh straight victory and 13th in their last 15 games.

Carpenter scored his 38th of the season on a power play at 18:57 of the period, assisted by Gartner.

The Capitals built their 2-0 lead in the first period on goals by Craig McLaughlin and Larry Murphy.

Boston 8, Hartford 4--Keith Crowder scored twice and Ken Linseman added three assists as the Bruins beat the Whalers at Hartford.

Louis Sleigher snapped a 2-2 tie for the Bruins 41 seconds into the second period, then Butch Goring and Dave Reid scored goals 20 seconds apart midway through the period to break the game open.

Hartford closed to 5-3 less than a minute later on Risto Siltanen’s goal at 10:58, but the Bruins outscored the Whalers, 3-1, in the third period.

In the final period, John Blum, Crowder and Mike Milbury scored for Boston, and Kevin Dineen scored for the Whalers, who have won once in their last seven games.

Winnipeg 6, Philadelphia 2--Laurie Boschman and Paul MacLean scored two goals each as the Jets swept their three-game season series against the Flyers with a victory at Winnipeg.

Scott Arniel and rookie defenseman Dave Ellett, who had two assists, also scored for Winnipeg.

The Flyers, who dressed only 19 players due to injuries to captain Dave Poulin and defenseman Mark Howe, never threatened after Derek Smith and Ron Sutter scored in the first period.

Buffalo 3, Quebec 2--Mike Foligno scored a pair of power-play goals, including the decisive score at 18:07 of the second period, to lead the Sabres to a victory at Buffalo that jumped them over the Nordiques into second place in the Adams Division.

Dave Andreychuk had the other Buffalo goal. Bruce Bell and Wilf Paiement scored for the Nordiques.

The victory was only the second this year for Buffalo against the Nordiques in six games.

Toronto 6, Chicago 2--Rick Vaive scored twice and Peter Ihnacak added a goal and two assists at Chicago as the Maple Leafs prevented the Black Hawks from taking over first place in the Norris Division.

The victory was only the 10th in 48 games for the Maple Leafs, who blew the game open with a four-goal burst in just over six minutes of the second period to take a 5-1 lead.

New York 3, Minnesota 2--Nick Fotiu scored with four seconds left in the second period to give the Rangers a victory over the North Stars at New York.

Mike Balisdell and Grant Ledyard scored the other New York goals and Glen Hanlon stopped 50 Minnesota shots.