Capitals 5, Islanders 2: Captain Alex Ovechkin scored his third goal in two games midway through the second period to snap a tie as Washington salvaged a split of its home-and-home series versus visiting New York.

Evgeny Kuznetsov and Marcus Johansson each scored a goal and set up another while defenseman Matt Niskanen collected three assists for the Capitals, who rebounded from Wednesday's 3-2 overtime loss at New York. Andre Burakovsky and Joel Ward also tallied while Braden Holtby finished with 26 saves.

Captain John Tavares and Anders Lee each scored for the second straight contest when the pair tallied 35 seconds apart late in the second period. Chad Johnson turned aside 22 shots for the Islanders, who saw their five-game winning streak come to a halt and fell for just the second time in 12 contests.

Tom Wilson's path up the right wing was denied by New York defenseman Calvin de Haan, but Ovechkin spotted the loose puck and wired a shot from the right faceoff circle past Johnson 9:53 into the middle session to give Washington a 3-2 lead. Kuznetsov doubled the advantage 5:56 into the third, wiring a hard wrist shot from the left circle off the far post and into the net.

Burakovsky tipped Niskanen's blast from the point inside the right post 11:51 into the game to open the scoring and Johansson's wrist shot from the top of the left circle squeezed inside the left post with 1:33 remaining in the first to give Washington a 2-0 lead. Tavares' sharp-angle shot from the right doorstep 31 seconds later halved the deficit and Lee redirected defenseman Travis Hamonic's shot at 19:33 to forge a tie.

GAME NOTEBOOK: Washington went 1-for-2 on the power play and has four goals with the man advantage in the last three contests after going 0-for-8 in its previous four. ... Islanders D Lubomir Visnovsky sat out the third period with an upper-body injury. ... New York's Brian Strait registered three shots in place of fellow D Johnny Boychuk, who didn't make the trip to Washington due to an upper-body injury.