shavings florida

Walk Like A Panther – For just the third time in the 2024-25 NHL season, the Capitals enter tonight’s tilt with the Florida Panthers having lost their last two games. The Caps dropped successive games in regulation Nov. 21-23 and Dec. 16-17, but they followed both of those tiny tailspins with multiple victories in succession.

Back on Nov. 25 in Florida, the Caps steered out of the first of those two-game slides with a 4-1 victory over the defending Stanley Cup champions in Florida. Tonight, they’ll aim to get back in the win column against the Cats once again, this time on home ice. Florida visits the District again on March 22.

The Caps and Panthers were all even at 1-1 after two periods of play in that Nov. 25 game in Florida, and Washington was able to snap the deadlock with Jakob Chychrun’s 5-on-3 power-play goal early in the third period. The Caps limited Florida to 21 shots on net in that game – the Cats’ single-game season low for the 54 games they’ve played in ’24-25 – and Logan Thompson stopped 20 of them. Washington bagged a pair of late empty-net goals to account for the 4-1 final.

“We looked at some of the stuff this morning from that game, and what we did well,” says Caps coach Spencer Carbery. “It was one of our better games of the season, down in Florida on the Mentors’ trip. And a lot of the things that we saw in that game are still consistent inside the Florida Panthers’ identity, which is no surprise.

“You can go back to last year, and they are very predictable with their structure. And I say that in the most respectful way possible, which is, you know every single one of their guys is on the exact same page with how they play, what's expected, the compete level that they play with, and the level of detail. There's not a lot of deviation in how they play.

“When you watch a Florida Panthers game, you know exactly what you're going to see nine times out of 10, generally. So we know what to expect; I felt like we did a pretty good job in that game, and we want to try to replicate a lot of those things here on home ice.”

Primer Coat – The opposition for the Caps’ current two-game homestand is a tandem of heavyweights; Saturday’s game against Winnipeg brought the best team from the NHL’s Western Conference to town and Tuesday’s tilt brings the defending Stanley Cup champion Panthers to the District. Facing Florida after going up against the Jets could benefit the Caps; the two elite teams share some characteristics in the heaviness of their forecheck and the amount of high-end skill spread through their roster.

“Florida [is] one of the best forechecking teams – with Winnipeg, with Carolina – in the National Hockey League,” says Carbery. “So we’re going to have to find ways of getting out of our own zone. That comes in a lot of different ways; it’s not just the same way every time. Sometimes, the forecheck looks a little different. Sometimes, it’s really aggressive. Sometimes, they’re being smart.

“I found their top line is more ‘forecheck readers.’ What I mean by that is they’re looking for where you’re going to go with the puck. So they’re trying to read what John Carlson’s options are, and then they go and try to that away. So they’re not guessing, it’s an educated guess to try to pick plays off as opposed to a straight-line Carolina forecheck coming right after you, going through your body, the same every single time. Which [Florida] has some lines that will do that.

“It definitely was an issue for us – breaking pucks out against Winnipeg, and you’ve got to give them credit, they’re a good forechecking team – but we have to do a better job, especially against teams that are willing and committed to putting pucks in behind you when they don’t have anything.”

Washington is a strong forechecking team as well and they will need to be tonight. The Panthers have been outshot in only 18 of 54 games this season, and they’ve only been outshot by as many as 10 – as the Caps did on Nov. 25 – three times. The Caps were able to get in on the forecheck against the Jets, and they were able to create scoring opportunities and score on the forecheck.

“Yeah, and I think we need to build off that, obviously,” says Caps winger Andrew Mangiapane. “I think it’s part of our identity, and it’s part of my game for sure, holding pucks down low, getting low-to-highs, get point shots, traffic to the net. And then do it again, and keep repeating that process; it wears teams down and it’s hard to play against, and hard to defend.

“That’s a good steppingstone for us against a good team like that. We’ve just got to keep building on it and keep wearing teams down.”

And again, the Caps can refer back to some of the things they did well in Saturday’s game against Winnipeg.

“The X Factor too – when we play well and we score a lot – our forwards track the puck very hard, like any good team does, and like Florida will, for sure,” says Caps defenseman John Carlson. “That’s one of their strengths. And against Winnipeg, you saw it a bunch of times. Like when their forwards come back and make a play, and then turn it [back] in [to the defensive zone], that’s when you can attack unstructured.

“But also, those are daggers as a [defenseman] when you’re trying to get off the ice or something like that as a forward, and all of a sudden it seems like it’s happening. And then a quick turnover and bang, they’re coming. Vegas is the same way; they backtrack. I think when you put a lot of pressure on cutbacks, and when you put a lot of pressure on their defensive zone structure by players doing that, it opens a lot of those plays up because guys are more squeezing their sticks because it’s the end of the shift, or they’re tired from what just happened. I think that’s when we’re at our best, and we had a bunch of those last game.”

In their own end, the Caps will sometimes need to be creative with their exits, and they will constantly need to be aware of potential trouble areas and potential exit routes.

“Obviously, Winnipeg plays that heavy style, their top guys are highly competitive, and they work really hard,” says Caps defenseman Trevor van Riemsdyk. “And Florida is a similar way; I think it's why they're so effective in the playoffs, and why they've had so much success, because even their top guys go to those dirty areas and do the hard things and are a pain to play against, not just because of their high end skill, but because of their work and their compete. And they make it tough when they dump pucks in, they'll run through you if they have to or they'll kind of make a skill play and do that, so we’ve got to worry about both. That makes it a little more challenging.”

In The Nets – Logan Thompson gets the net for Washington tonight against the Panthers. He has won 23 of his 28 starts this season, and he has yielded two or fewer goals against in 19 of his last 24 starts. Lifetime against Florida, Thompson is 2-1-0 in three appearances and starts, with a 2.67 GAA and a .914 save pct.

Sergei Bobrovsky is the expected starting goaltender for Florida tonight. With 418 career victories, Bobrovsky ranks 11th all time and he is currently second among active goalies, trailing only Minnesota’s Marc-Andre Fleury (572). Lifetime against Washington, Bobrovsky is 14-13-5 in 34 appearances – all starts – with a shutout, a 2.98 GAA and a .901 save pct.

All Lined Up – Here’s how we believe the Capitals and Panthers might look on Tuesday night in the District:

WASHINGTON

Forwards

8-Ovechkin, 17-Strome, 43-Wilson

21-Protas, 80-Dubois, 24-McMichael

16-Raddysh, 20-Eller, 53-Frank

22-Duhaime, 26-Dowd, 88-Mangiapane

Defensemen

38-Sandin, 74-Carlson

42-Fehervary, 3-Roy

6-Chychrun, 57-van Riemsdyk

Goaltenders

48-Thompson

79-Lindgren

Extras

13-Vrana

27-Alexeyev

52-McIlrath

Out/Injured

15-Milano (upper body)

19-Backstrom (hip)

77-Oshie (back)

FLORIDA

Forwards

23-Verhaeghe, 16-Barkov, 13-Reinhart

70-Boqvist, 9-Bennett, 19-Tkachuk

27-Luostarinen, 15-Lundell, 17-Rodrigues

12-Gadjovich, 92-Nosek, 10-Greer

Defensemen

42-Forsling, 5-Ekblad

77-Mikkola, 7-Kulikov

26-Balinskis, 88-Schmidt

Goaltenders

72-Bobrovsky

30-Knight

Extras

None

Out/Injured

25-Samoskevich (illness)