The Washington Capitals will begin 2024 with a date with the Pittsburgh Penguins. The Capitals began the regular season against the Penguins back on Oct. 13, and were blanked 4-0 in a very lopsided affair.
Washington has not been the same team since the holiday break. The Capitals have dropped their last four contests, most recently falling 3-2 in a shootout to the Nashville Predators.
Here are the current projected lines.
Alex Ovechkin – Evgeny Kuznetsov – Tom Wilson
Aliaksei Protas – Connor McMichael – Anthony Mantha
Hendrix Lapierre – Dylan Strome – Matthew Phillips
Beck Malenstyn – Nic Dowd – Nicolas Aube-Kubel
Martin Fehervary – John Carlson
Joel Edmundson – Ethan Bear
Rasmus Sandin – Trevor van Riemsdyk
Darcy Kuemper
Hunter Shepard
Scratched: Max Pacioretty (achillies), T.J. Oshie (upper, day-to-day), Sonny Milano (upper week-to-week), Charlie Lindgren (upper, day-to-day), Nicklas Backstrom (hip)
The Capitals (17-11-6) are going on their second straight back-to-back slate, with two division foes in the Penguins and the New Jersey Devils to follow on Wednesday. They have been very good in those situations, winning their first six games on the second leg of the series. However, that streak was snapped against the Predators.
“I think the focus for us as a staff and our group and what we’re drawing their attention to is the Pittsburgh Penguins tomorrow night,” Capitals head coach Spencer Carbery said following Monday’s practice. “Whether you’re looking at the month, the 16 games that we have until the [All-Star] break, you’re losing focus of what’s important. And then tomorrow night is the most important game we’ve got on the schedule and it’s a really important game for our team overall.”
The Capitals continue to struggle scoring at five-on-five. Carbery continues to mix and match the right line combinations that will produce the most offense. After playing wing for the first time, Evgeny Kuznetsov was reunited on the top line with Alex Ovechkin and Tom Wilson. Dylan Strome, who had been centering the top line for most of the season, will be the middleman for the third line.
They have only played seven games together has a line and have only scored twice, along with generating eight high-danger chances.
“We’re still trying to find some consistency from that line, and I know that line has moved around. I say that all-encompassing of sort of that top six of how that looks. I felt like we went on a good little run there with [Ovechkin], Stromer and Willy. There wasn’t a lot of production, but I thought they played solid and we were winning games,” Carbery said. “It was sort of that stretch where we were grinding games out. And now, as we’ve sort of started to struggle to score and to be able to win those tight games or keep the games tight, we need to find something in that top six.”
Ethan Bear made his Capitals debut against the Predators and logged 20:05 worth of ice time. He also had a prime scoring opportunity that hit the post. Carbery was very pleased with his game. Washington signed the 26-year-old defenseman to a two-year, $4.125 million contract.
Head coach Spencer Carbery discusses kicking off 2024 action with the team’s first visit to Pittsburgh this season tomorrow night.#ALLCAPS pic.twitter.com/S60nPqgYHa
— Washington Capitals (@Capitals) January 1, 2024
“Competitiveness. Won a bunch of pucks, felt like he was in good spots positionally to set himself up for success when he was defending the rush,” Carbery said. “So, I liked his game overall and going back through the film, I still like it. There’s a few things with with every defensemen as he gets more comfortable in our system that I think he’ll even be able to continue to progress.”
Even though the Caps’ power play has started to improve, it was 0-for-3 against the Predators. Aliaksei Protas was slotted in on the power play during Monday’s practice. Protas continues to be Washington’s best set up man. He is second on the Capitals with 15 assists and has five assists in his last six games.
“He’s been one of our best players overall this year. And that didn’t start that way, and it’s well documented and he’s continued to get better, better [and] better. With specifically to the passing and his ability to set up like you see, he sees the ice really well when he has the puck and knows where his options are,” Carbery said. “He’s just playing at a high level now. He’s playing three-on-three overtime, four-on-four he’s out there now, late in games, protecting leads. He’s become now one of our top players and so we’re going to try to get him out there in every situation we can.”
Martin Fehervary, who was injured against the New York Islanders, is TBD according to Carbery. He did practice on Monday and skated on the top pair with John Carlson. Meanwhile, Carbery says that Max Pacioretty will hopefully make his season debut next week.
T.J. Oshie and Sonny Milano are still ways away from playing, but Charlie Lindgren isn’t expected to be out long-term. All three of them are dealing with upper-body injuries.
Scouting Pittsburgh
The Penguins (18-13-4) are on a six-game point streak and have won three straight games. They are coming off a 3-1 win against the New York Islanders and are 7-2-1 over the last 10 games.
Similar to the Capitals, scoring has been a been a struggle for the Penguins, mustering just three goals per game with is 21st in the league. Meanwhile, its power play has been dreadful operating at just 13%.
The Penguins have been without forward Bryan Rust for the last 10 games but is eligible to come off of injured-reserve for Tuesday’s matchup.
Jake Guentzel leads Pittsburgh with 40 points (16 goals, 24 assists) in 35 games and has six points (two goals, four assists) in his last five games.
Player To Watch
Defenseman Kris Letang has nine points in his last five games. He had six assists in Pittsburgh’s 7-0 win over the Islanders, becoming the first defenseman since 1986 to record six assists in a game. He was also the seventh defenseman in NHL history to do so.
Letang has 23 points (three goals, 20 assists) in 35 games this season.
Puck drop is slated for 7:30 p.m. The game can be streamed on ESPN+ and Hulu.
By Jacob Cheris