With the lockout a little over a month old, Karl Alzner‘s dog Murphy decided to show the type of free-thinking and ingenuity that will be needed to end the NHL’s labor dispute. Presumably using his paws, Murphy jimmied the crate door open (again) and left his calling card on the carpet.

The reign of terror in the Alzner household continues.

Photo via @KarlAlzner

Despite his strong play throughout the season, Karl Alzner might be more famous lately for his dogs’ bad behavior.

A month ago, as Alzner and his fiancee Mandy left for Game Three against the Rangers, they decided to leave their dogs out of their crate for the night. Of course, that was the night that the game went into triple overtime, and when the two returned at 2 AM, their dogs Charlie, Murphy, and Duncan had trashed their home.

Well, apparently crating the dogs doesn’t work either. Over the weekend, Alzner tweeted video that his family took of the dogs escaping while they were out of the house, and the results lead us to believe that these dogs might actually be smarter than some Caps players.

For the dog pun version of this story, visit NBC Washington.

Early Thursday morning, a disappointed and exhausted Karl Alzner returned home with his fiancé Mandy. Alzner, who was on the ice when the Rangers’ Marian Gaborik ended Game Three in triple overtime, had just participated in the longest NHL game since 2008 and the third longest game in Washington Capitals history.

Unfortunately for Karl, the deflating loss was just the beginning of his problems. In a tweet at 2 AM, Alzner published a photo with the caption Dogs not happy about the loss either. In the picture, Alzner’s dogs can be seen posing — proudly — in front of his trashed living room.

D’awwwwww.

Since then the photo has gone viral, showing up on multiple national websites. On Friday, NHL Live hosts EJ Hradek and Deb Placey asked Karl to tell the story behind the picture.

“In the picture on the left is Duncan and on the right is Charlie,” Alzner began. “Another culprit is Murphy, who me and Mandy assume is the ringleader. He was hiding at the time.”

“I was excited to be home and see the dogs,” Alzner, who estimated that he got 2,500 more twitter followers due to the photo, explained. “Usually we have them in a crate, but Mandy was leaving early to go to the game and we knew that they’d be in [the crates] for a while.”

That’s when the 23-year-old Capitals defenseman felt sorry for his pets and decided to let them be free and roam the house for the night.

“We thought maybe we’ll give them a chance,” he said. “Everything should be fine. Then we came in and they greeted us at the door. We took them outside to go to the bathroom and then we walked up the stairs and sure enough, there was their mess.”

Alzner was shocked by the destruction. It was obviously the last thing he wanted to see that night after such a tough loss.

Lesson learned, right? From now on, the Caps just need to end all their games in regulation so that his dogs won’t run wild. Alzner disagreed: “I have a feeling they got to work on that right away.”

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