Caps Face Bolts in Tampa Bay
Two of the Eastern Conference's elite teams look to get back in the win column on Saturday night in Tampa when the Capitals take on the Lightning.
© Scott Audette/Getty Images
Heading into the 2016-17 NHL season, both the Capitals and the Tampa Bay Lightning were seen as elite Eastern Conference clubs that were likely to vie for the top spot in their respective divisions and the conference overall. Just past the quarter mark of the campaign, the two teams are occupying the two wild card spots in the Eastern Conference playoff picture, somewhat south of where each expects to be at season's end.
On Saturday night in Tampa, the Capitals and Lightning will tangle for the first of three times this season, and the first of two times this month. Tampa Bay will make its lone visit to the District this season on Dec. 23.
Last season, the Capitals became the first team in four decades to navigate their way through an entire NHL regular season without suffering back-to-back regulations losses. But Thursday night's home ice whitewashing (3-0) at the hands of the New York Islanders leaves the Caps saddled with consecutive regulation defeats for the second time in 22 games this season.
Washington's longest winning streak of the 2016-17 season - a five-game run - followed its first pair of consecutive setbacks on Oct. 22-26. On Saturday against the Lightning, the Caps will once again be seeking to avoid their first three-game regulation slide in more than 21 months, since Feb. 22-27, 2015.
"It's one of those things where you don't want to put too much pressure on yourselves because of the situation in the past, because you really want to stay in the moment," says Caps goaltender Braden Holtby. "But throughout last year we were able to step up and kind of control games after a loss. Even though we played better [Thursday] night, we still have a lot more left that we can put out there, and I think we realize that.
"It's been a little more challenging this year, which can be good for us if we use it in the right way to keep pushing us forward, to grow as a team and grow in different areas. We grew from the last game [on Saturday] in Toronto and we want to keep pushing forward in that aspect."
In Thursday's loss to the Islanders, the Caps had five power play opportunities when the game was still scoreless. They repeatedly fired shots in the general direction of New York netminder Jaroslav Halak on those man advantage opportunities, but only six of their 25 shot attempts with the extra man actually went on goal. A dozen of those bids missed the mark altogether, and seven more were blocked.
Alex Ovechkin hit the post on a Washington power play early in the third period, but the Caps again came up empty. Within roughly a minute of killing off that Caps power play, the Islanders' Shane Prince scored on a breakaway to give New York a 1-0 lead. It turned out to be the first of three Islanders goals in less than five minutes.
The Caps' failure to score on the power play likely cost them Thursday night's game.
"I think you get a lot more momentum from killing penalties than you do from the power play," says Caps coach Barry Trotz. "I think the power play can be an intimidating factor for you [when it's working].
"I know we were 0-for-6 [Thursday] and I know we had lots of chances. We had some open nets and we had some chances, but we didn't score. In a 0-0 game, we were skating and we were creating chances in terms of power play chances. We had six opportunities, and you're doing a lot of things right to draw those penalties. At the same time, you want to convert on those, especially in the third [period] when it was 0-0 we had a real good chance to take the game in hand right off of the start of the period. It gave us a little momentum, and we came up with a couple of five-on-five shifts where we had a lot of zone time and were buzzing around.
"All of a sudden, [the Islanders] come down and they score. And it is a little bit deflating, but those are the mental components that you've got to fight through. They scored three goals in [less than five minutes]. It seemed very quick and our bench sort of sagged there, no question."
Washington fired a total of 87 shot attempts in Thursday's game, but Halak only had to make 38 saves. But the Caps were a lot better against the Isles than they were against the Maple Leafs last Saturday. They'll focus on the good things they did against the Isles and try to put forth a more consistent overall performance on Saturday in Tampa.
"We had a couple of breakdowns, and sometimes they happen," says Holtby. "But it wasn't a lack of effort or energy or preparation [Thursday] night. It was just that the game didn't quite give us any breaks, and when that happens, you've got to find ways to push through it. That can be with a big save, a big hit or a big goal - something to change the momentum. And that's something we need to be better at."
Tampa Bay comes into Saturday's game tied with the Boston Bruins for third place in the Atlantic Division standings, but Boston has played one fewer game. The Bolts and B's are seven points behind front-running Montreal, which plays in San Jose on Friday night.
After rolling out to a 5-1 start to the season, the Lightning has gone 8-10-1 in its last 19 games, a stretch that includes a four-game winning streak in mid-November. Tampa Bay carries a four-game losing streak into Saturday's game with the Capitals. Most recently, the Lightning came up on the short end of a 5-4 score against the Blues in St. Louis on Thursday. The Bolts have surrendered four or more goals against in each of those four straight losses, and Tampa Bay ranks 20th in the league in goals against per game (2.76).
Backup goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy started each of the last two games for the Lightning, a 5-1 loss at Columbus on Tuesday and Thursday's loss to the Blues. But Vasilveskiy was pulled early in the second period of the game in St. Louis, with the Lightning in a 4-1 hole. Ben Bishop came on in relief and helped stop the bleeding as Tampa Bay rallied offensively, but the Lightning still came up short at night's end.
The Lightning is without captain Steven Stamkos, who suffered a lateral meniscus tear in his right knee on Nov. 15. Stamkos is expected to miss about four months of action.
Nip It In The Bud -Washington carries a two-game regulation losing streak with it to Tampa for Saturday's game with the Lightning. The Caps will be seeking to avoid their first three-game slide in 21 months while the Lightning will be looking to halt their own losing streak at four.
The Capitals have also dropped three straight road games (0-2-1). It has been nearly two calendar years since they found themselves in a longer road slide; the Caps went on a five-game road losing streak (0-3-2) from Jan. 8-31, 2015, midway through Barry Trotz's first season behind the Washington bench.
After getting through last season without suffering back-to-back regulation setbacks at any point, the Caps have endured that indignity twice in the first 22 games of the 2016-17 season. After their first set of regulation losses on Oct. 22-26, the Caps promptly reeled off five straight wins, their longest string of victories this season.
"We've got to be urgent," says Caps center Jay Beagle. "You have to be an urgent team. We don't like losing two in a row, and three in a row is not acceptable. We have to come out and match their desperation, because they're going to be desperate as well. It's going to be a good game. It's going to be two teams that should be pretty desperate and it should be a pretty fast-paced game."
Washington's last string of three straight regulation losses came on Feb. 22-27, 2015.
Been A While - Although the Capitals and the Lightning are both Eastern Conference clubs and they face one another three times each season, Washington hasn't seen Tampa Bay in nearly a year, since Dec. 18, 2015. All of the three meetings between the two teams last season came in a span of 22 days from late November to mid-December.
"It feels like forever since we played them," says Caps goaltender Braden Holtby. "We know what kind of team they are, though obviously they're different with [Steven Stamkos] out of the lineup. In years past, that's always been such a key when you play them, is paying attention to where he is. But they've got some dynamic forwards.
"You hear a lot about that Brayden Point kid, who's from back where I'm from. So you know he's a guy we're going to have to key on, and he's a guy that we don't know. And then there are other talented forwards there, too. It's going to be a good challenge for us."
The Ocho - Caps captain Alex Ovechkin has done a lot of damage against the Lightning over the course of his NHL career.
Ovechkin has totaled 40 goals and 81 points in 60 career contests against Tampa Bay, the second highest point total he has recorded against any one franchise in his career. (He has rolled up 88 points against Atlanta/Winnipeg.) Ovechkin is second in NHL history in most points and most goals against the Lightning. He is one point behind Florida's Jaromir Jagr (82) for most points ever against the Bolts and he is one goal behind ex-Caps sniper Peter Bondra (41) for most goals ever against the Lightning.
Ovechkin has recorded 25 mutiple-point games and nine multiple-goal games against Tampa Bay over the course of his NHL career.
Power Point - Washington's scuffling power play unit goes up against the Lightning's struggling penalty killing outfit in Saturday's game. With T.J. Oshie still sidelined with an upper body injury, Trotz has been toying with the personnel on both of his units, moving the pieces around and trying to find a combination that clicks.
"We've been getting looks and we've been getting chances," says Caps coach Barry Trotz. "I've just been moving guys here and there to see if we can just spark something, just as I do with [forward] lines, I put guys [together] who have played together and then they get separated and then they come back together. We wanted to flip it out and see if get some new chemistry or rekindle chemistry."
Early last season, Trotz told me
he and his staff wanted to work in a second alternate power play alignment
that would have different personnel and different focal points. That plan never actually came to fruition last season, probably at least partially because the extra-man unit was fairly consistent throughout the campaign.
With this year's model having trouble getting on track, Trotz believes this could be a good time to take another look at that plan of action.
"We definitely have talked about it," says the Caps' bench boss. "We're just trying to get our regular power play going. That's something that we've talked about a little bit more obviously from the summer and as the season has gone on, but we've been trying to get this one going. But we definitely will be revisiting that for sure."
Practice Time - Washington endured a rugged stretch of scheduling near the end of November in which it played nine games in a span of 16 nights. That didn't leave much time for practice, but the Caps did have the somewhat rare luxury of two consecutive practice days on Nov. 21-22 and they had a couple of non-consecutive practice days in between their Nov. 26 game in Toronto and Thursday's loss to the Islanders at Verizon Center.
Some teams in the league - like Chicago and the New York Rangers - are moving toward more frequent practices and fewer morning skates on the day of games. While the Caps do occasionally eschew morning skates altogether, Washington frequently makes those game day skates optional.
"I don't know what the numbers are this year, but it seems like we're having more real practice days this year and fewer morning skates so far," says Caps defenseman Matt Niskanen. "I'm sure there's a reasoning behind it, but it's kind of nice to get some practices in where you can work on some things closer to full speed.
"Now, morning skate is more of just a warmup. [In practice] we've had a lot of work on up-and-down-the-ice rushes and backchecking and defending rushes, coming into defensive zone coverage and trying to generate things three-on-two and a lot of drills like that. When you don't play for a couple of days you can actually push it; you can go hard and you can try a few new things on the practice rink. It's good for us to push ourselves through these things and to try to get something out of it."
In The Nets -Holtby gets the start for the Capitals here tonight, as he seeks to avoid his first personal three-game losing streak since Feb. 22-27, 2015. He is 10-6-1 on the season with a shutout, a 2.23 GAA and a .919 save pct. He will be taking his third crack at his 11th win of the season tonight in Tampa.
Holtby is 7-2-1 lifetime against the Lightning, with a 3.04 GAA and .906 save pct. Lifetime in Saturday games, Holtby is 41-15-7 with eight shutouts, a 2.21 GAA and a .924 save pct.
After Andrei Vasilevskiy started each of the Lightning's last two games, Ben Bishop gets the net back tonight for the Bolts. Bishop came on in relief on Thursday in St. Louis and stopped nine of 10 shots he faced in about 37 minutes of work. Bishop is 7-9-0 on the season with a 2.99 GAA and a .902 save pct.
Lifetime against Washington, Bishop is 1-6-1 with a 3.74 GAA and an .880 save pct.
All Lined Up - Here's how we expect the Capitals and the Lightning to look when they take to the ice on Saturday night at Amalie Arena:
WASHINGTON
Forwards
8-Ovechkin, 19-Backstrom, 90-Johansson
65-Burakovsky, 92-Kuznetsov, 13-Vrana
28-Carey, 20-Eller, 14-Williams
10-Connolly, 83-Beagle, 43-Wilson
Defensemen
9-Orlov, 74-Carlson
27-Alzner, 2-Niskanen
44-Orpik, 88-Schmidt
Goaltenders
70-Holtby
31-Grubauer
Scratched
4-Chorney
26-Winnik
Injured
77-Oshie (upper body, week to week)
TAMPA BAY
Forwards
18-Palat, 9-Johnson, 86-Kucherov
21-Point, 51-Filppula, 17-Killorn
92-Vermin, 13-Paquette, 27-Drouin
90-Namestnikov, 11-Boyle, 15-Bournival
Defensemen
77-Hedman, 6-Stralman
89-Nesterov, 55-Coburn
29-Koekkoek, 62-Sustr
Goaltenders
30-Bishop
88-Vasilevskiy
Scratches
23-Brown
Injured
5-Garrison (undisclosed)
24-Callahan (lower body)
91-Stamkos (torn meniscus)
