Beagle's late goal lifts Capitals to 3-2 win over Jets

WINNIPEG, Manitoba – Jay Beagle was rewarded for not giving up on Tuesday night.

The veteran Washington forward scored with 30 seconds left in the third period to lift the Capitals to a 3-2 victory over the Winnipeg Jets for their third straight win.

Beagle scored the winning goal off a draw in the Winnipeg zone.

"I won the draw back and (defenseman John Carlson) whiffs on it," said Beagle, who had two assists in a weekend win over Calgary. "I tried to whack at it and it hopped over my stick. I was pushing laterally and just tried to slide it through and it went in. It was one of those goals where if you keep whacking at it, eventually it goes in."

Braden Holtby made 43 saves, Marcus Johansson had a goal and an assist, and Karl Alzner also scored for Washington, which has won six of nine this season (6-2-1). Evgeny Kuznetsov had two assists in the finale of the Capitals' four-game trip to Canada.

Mark Scheifele and Adam Lowry scored for the Jets, and Connor Hellebuyck finished with 24 saves.

"We played well tonight," Jets captain Blake Wheeler said. "You take from it that all is not fair in this league and try to replicate that game on Thursday night."

The teams conclude a home-and-home set at Washington on Thursday night.

Holtby wasn't feeling too great about anything other than the two points.

"If (the Jets) had a little luck on their side, they probably would have came out on top in this one, and we know that," Holtby said. "But we battled it out. Sometimes they're not pretty."

With the Capitals leading 2-0, Scheifele got the Jets on the scoreboard with his fifth of the season with just under 7 minutes remaining. With the teams playing 4-on-4, Scheifele took a rebound and fired a shot through a narrow opening between Holtby and the postfor his team-leading ninth point of the season.

Lowry tied it with about 2 1/2 minutes to go with his first of the season. Winnipeg winger Joel Armia fought for the puck off the boards and passed it to Lowry, who went in front of Holtby and waited until he was sprawled on the ice to fire the puck into the net.

"Obviously, we're happy we came back in it, but at the end of the day we still didn't finish it off," Scheifele said. "I think there are a lot of guys that are happy with the way that we played. We played good throughout the whole game. Putting up over 45 shots or whatever we had against a team like that is big for us. It's definitely tough to lose a game when you come back like that."

Alzner scored his second goal of the season with 44 seconds left in the first period. His shot from the point appeared to change direction through traffic and went over Hellebuyck's glove. It gave the Capitals the first goal for the eighth time in nine games this season.

Winnipeg forward Shawn Matthias suffered a lower-body injury in the first period and didn't return.

Johansson made it 2-0 at 8:15 of the second after a Jets turnover in the neutral zone. Kuznetsov got the puck and went behind the net before feeding a pass to Johansson, whose shot from close in front went under Hellebuyck.

"I gave it to (Kuznetsov) and he pretty much did everything and he gave it right back to me in front of the net," Johannson said. "I got lucky it went in. I mean, (the puck) was laying on top of (Hellebuyck's) pad. I kind of missed a half-open net at first, but sometimes it's just going your way a little bit. It's good to see it go in."

NOTES: Johansson's sixth goal of the season was his fifth in three games and gave him a team-leading 11 points. ... Even before Matthias' went out, Winnipeg was without injured veteran D Tyler Myers and F Drew Stafford.

UP NEXT

Capitals: Host Winnipeg on Thursday night to open a three-game homestand.

Jets: At Washington on Thursday night in the opener of a three-game road trip.