Photo: @Capitals

On his first day running practice for the Washington Capitals, head coach Peter Laviolette has made some changes to his team’s lineup after they ended last season by going 15-14-3 in their final 32 regular-season games and went 2-5-1 in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. The most noticeable change was a top-defensive pairing of reigning Norris Trophy runner-up John Carlson and Dmitry Orlov.

Brenden Dillon and Justin Schultz made up the second-pairing and Nick Jensen remained in his spot from last year despite the Capitals signing Trevor Van Riemsdyk over the summer. Jonas Siegenthaler covered for newly-signed Zdeno Chara and will likely continue to do so until he is able to join the team. Chara is in quarantine after signing with the Capitals on Wednesday.

On forward, Laviolette made no changes to his top-six forward group but flipped Carl Hagelin and Richard Panik in the bottom-six. Newly-signed Conor Sheary slotted in at third-line left wing.

You can see how the overall lineup looks below:

Initial Capitals lines this AM:

Ovechkin-Kuznetsov-Wilson
Vrana-Backstrom-Oshie
Sheary-Eller-Panik
Hagelin-Dowd-Hathaway

Orlov-Carlson
Dillon-Schultz
Siegenthaler-Jensen
Fehervary-TvR

Samsonov
Vanecek

*No Chara today

— Samantha Pell (@SamanthaJPell) January 4, 2021

By Harrison Brown

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