Tom Wilson saw Will Smith at the Oscars and decided to one-up him.
Near the end of the Washington Capitals’ blowout loss to Carolina on Monday night, the hard-hitting forward brought out the fisticuffs with Hurricanes defenseman Brendan Smith.
There aren’t as many fights in the NHL nowadays, but Wilson’s throwdown with Smith was a throwback.
The fight lasted more than a minute, and haymakers were thrown. Wilson got the best of Smith, landing two uppercuts near the end of the fight to bloody his nose and earning thunderous applause by the home crowd at Capital One Arena.
We got a slugfest in Washington
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It’s unclear what exactly led to the brouhaha, but it could have something to do with Smith’s hits on Nic Dowd and Evgeny Kuznetsov in previous games this season. The hit on Dowd has kept the veteran center out for the last two weeks with an upper-body injury.
While Wilson won the fight and scored Washington’s lone goal, it was Smith’s Hurricanes who got the last laugh with the 6-1 triumph. The win was Carolina’s first in four tries against the Capitals this season. The Hurricanes lead the Eastern Conference in points and have been atop the Metropolitan Division for most of the past four months.
The blowout defeat was a bad end to a great month for the Capitals. After struggling earlier in the new year, Washington’s 9-3-1 record in March was the best month for the team since November.
• Jacob Calvin Meyer can be reached at jmeyer@washingtontimes.com.
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