The Blue Jackets led in shots 22-14 after two periods.
“They have a lot of skill,” Thompson said. “Like we saw earlier in preseason, they shoot a lot of pucks, so I think from a goalie standpoint, those are easy games to get up for knowing you’re going to see a lot of rubber.
“I know they had a decent amount of shots tonight, but I thought the guys in front of me did a good job of letting me see everything.”
Ovechkin extended the lead to 2-0 with a shot from just above the right circle after Dylan Strome won a face-off.
“It’s one of those plays that I think we might have had one last year, maybe two, but I think it was one,” Strome said. “Just one of those that sometimes you get lucky on and we’ll take it for now.”
Justin Sourdif then pushed it to 3-0 on a breakaway at 2:40 of the third with Thompson getting the secondary assist.
“We felt we put a lot of good minutes in in the first and second, but we weren’t able to get one by them,” Blue Jackets captain Boone Jenner said. “That’s up to us to stay with it. Stay patient. It’s going to come if we keep playing like that, but it got away from us there.
“We just gave them too many chances. A win off the draw and then a breakaway after that.”
Mateychuk cut it to 3-1 at 10:20, scoring in front off a pass from below the goal line by Sean Monahan. It was Mateychuk’s second goal in two games.