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Dmitry Orlov Skates, But Will Not Play Against Flames: Notes From Saturday’s Morning Skate In Calgary

Jon Sorensen


The Washington Capitals made their way to Calgary, Alberta, Thursday night following their 3-2 overtime loss to the Seattle Kraken. They next face the Flames on Saturday night. Puck drop is set for 10PM. [Preview Here.]
The team held morning skate at the ScotiaBank Saddledome in Calgary on Saturday morning. The forward lines and defensive pairs at this morning’s skate:

Alex Ovechkin — Dylan Strome — Conor Sheary
Sonny Milano— Evgeny Kuznetsov — T.J. Oshie
Marcus Johansson — Lars Eller — Anthony Mantha
Aliaksei Protas — Nic Dowd — Garnet Hathaway

Erik Gustafsson — John Carlson
Martin Fehervary — Nick Jensen
Alex Alexeyev — Trevor van Riemsdyk

Darcy Kuemper
Charlie Lindgren

Extras: Dmitry Orlov, Joe Snively, Nicolas Aube-Kubel, Matt Irwin

Capitals defenseman Dmitry Orlov (lower body, IR) participated in morning skate but will once again be out tonight against Calgary, per Laviolette. [per Samantha Pell/ Washington Post]

Injuries: Tom Wilson, Nicklas Backstrom, Carl Hagelin, Connor Brown, Beck Malenstyn.

FIGHTING THE FLAMES

The Washington Capitals conclude their regular-season series with the Calgary Flames on Saturday night just eight days after they shut Calgary out by a score of 3-0 at Capital One Arena. Washington has points in seven straight games vs. Calgary (6-0-1) and is 13-3-3 against them since 2010-11.

Action from Scotiabank Saddledome can be seen on NBC Sports Washington in-market or ESPN+ out-of-market starting at 10 PM ET. [Preview Here]

STAT OF THE DAY – (RE) WORKING OVERTIME?

Today’s “stat of the day” is more food for thought. Laviolette decided to start Thursday night’s overtime against the Kraken, which lasted all of seven seconds, with John Carlson, Lars Eller and T.J. Oshie.

Several stats indicate that this might/might not have been the best move, including the players expected goals for percentage (xGF%). We don’t know many of the underlying factors (potential injuries, etc.), but the philosophy does align with Laviolette’s well-known preference for veterans in key situations, regardless.

Laviolette also had to send out the Capitals players before Seattle, so he may have been trying to put the best players out there for potentially seeing all four of the Kraken’s lines. Interesting strategy.

BONUS STAT – GOALS-PALOOZA

Today’s bonus stat plots the goals per game average from 1993-94 to the first full month of this season. (courtesy of JFreshHockey).

At 6.4 goals per game, NHL scoring is at its highest level since 1993-94. In that time, it fell as low as 5.1 in the dead puck era and stagnated around 5.5 in the early 2010s before taking off in 2017-18.

DOWN ON THE FARM

Ivan Miroshnichenko made his first appearance with Avangard’s KHL club on Saturday, participating in the team’s practice. He is expected to make his first start in the KHL this weekend.

Haakon Hanelt had a nice pass of the boards for Gatineau’s first goal on Saturday. The goal launched the team’s annual teddy bear toss.

Alexander Suzdalev had a nice primary assist in last night’s game against Prince George.

And finally, a tip of the cap to goaltender Hunter Shepard, who was named the AHL goaltender of the month this week. Shepard is the first Bears netminder to earn this honor since future NHL All-Star Braden Holtby was named the AHL Goalie of the Month nearly 10 years ago in December 2012.

By Jon Sorensen

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