Jakub Vrana spoiled the St. Louis Blues' banner-raising party.
Vrana scored at 2 minutes, 51 seconds of overtime to give the Washington Capitals a 3-2 victory over the Stanley Cup champions on Wednesday night in the NHL opener for both teams.
Vrana beat Jordan Binnington with a high snap shot for his first point in five career games against the Blues. It was only Binnington's third loss in 17 career home games.
"I just tried to do what I can do best," Vrana said. "He made some saves, but the last one he didn't. It was a long shift and we were kind of tired. Once, I got a little speed it was a quick snap shot and it went through him. So, I was happy for that one."
Alex Ovechkin and Dmitry Orlov also scored for the Capitals. After allowing two goals on the first three shots he faced, Braden Holtby stopped the final 19 he faced.
"It's obviously not an ideal start to the season but I felt like I played the goals fairly well," Holtby said. "I just misread little bits of them to execute them. I knew I wasn't far off."
Sammy Blais and Alex Pietrangelo scored for the Blues, and Binnington made 31 saves.
"To me our whole game [Wednesday], we weren't aggressive," Blues coach Craig Berube said. "We didn't play our game. The first period was fine, but after that I felt we got away from our game and just didn't have that aggressive mind-set and didn't manage the puck well."
