#CapsSabres Skate Shavings: End Of The Road

The Caps' season-long four-game road trip comes to a conclusion on Monday afternoon in Buffalo against the Sabres. Washington is 1-1-1 on the trip to date, so the outcome of Monday's trip final will ultimately determine the trip's success or lack thereof.

Washington has been inconsistent on this trip, to put it mildly. The Caps played a great game of road hockey for 54 or 55 minutes in Tuesday's trip opener in Winnipeg, but squandered a late two-goal lead and had to settle for a 4-3 overtime loss and a single point. Two nights later, the Caps turned in an excellent 60-minute performance in a 5-2 win over the Wild in Minnesota.

But as good as they were in Minnesota the Caps turned in one of their poorest collective performances in recent seasons on Saturday in Chicago, coming out on the wrong end of a 7-1 shellacking with their fathers and mentors in attendance. Saturday's loss matches the most lopsided one suffered by the Caps this season; they fell 8-2 to the Flyers in Philadelphia on Oct. 14.

"That's the good thing about the 82-game season," says Caps right wing Tom Wilson. "Anytime you have a bad one, there's pretty much another one coming up soon. We're going to obviously be expected to come out and play better than we did in Chicago, it's as simple as that. We're going to have a couple of meetings here and make sure we're good to go."

New Man - The Caps announced a trade a couple hours ahead of Monday's matinee with the Sabres. Washington has obtained defenseman Michal Kempny from the Chicago Blackhawks, in exchange for a third-round pick in the 2018 NHL Draft. The Caps hold two third-rounders for 2018, their own and Toronto's, which Washington obtained in the Marcus Johansson swap with New Jersey last summer.

Kempny is a 27-year-old native of the Czech Republic who debuted in the NHL last season after spending several seasons playing professionally in his native country, and one season - the 2015-16 campaign - in the KHL. Chicago signed Kempny and brought him to North America in 2016-17.

He has played a total of 81 NHL games spread over his two seasons here, totaling three goals and 15 points. A strong skater and an adept puck over, Kempny has shown good possession numbers in his time in the NHL, posting a 56.3% Corsi rating in 2016-17 and a 53.9% mark this season.

"I think he gives us obviously a little more depth," says Caps coach Barry Trotz of Monday's trade. "We got to see him the other day [in Chicago against the Hawks]. But he's a real good skater and he's a little bit more of a veteran player. His first pass I thought was pretty good in the game, and they got to pass the puck a lot against us the other night."

A left-handed shot, Kempny carries a low salary cap hit of just $900,000 and he will be an unrestricted free agent at season's end. The Caps won't have to make a corresponding roster move to accommodate Kempny's arrival, and his salary is low enough that they may have room for another minor addition or two.

"I think he just goes in the mix," says Trotz. "We think he is going to help our [defense]."

Seeking A Response - On Saturday night in Chicago, the Caps rarely had the puck and they played poorly without it. That's a lethal combination and it's why Washington found itself on the wrong end of a 7-1 score at night's end..

It's also been a bit of a recurring problem of late. The Caps have permitted four or more goals in five of their last eight games, and they've fallen to 20th in the league in goals against. Among the teams below the Caps in that category are just two teams with any realistic playoff hopes, New Jersey and the New York Islanders.

Clearly, the Caps need to shore up those areas, and Trotz went on at length about the situation after Sunday's practice in Buffalo, as did defenseman Matt Niskanen.

Said Trotz:

"My biggest disappointment is I thought the game in Winnipeg, for 90 percent of that game, we played against a very good team in very tough building extremely well. We followed that up with almost a complete game in Minnesota in a really tough building, [against a team with] a great home record - a team that was desperate for points and playing very well. We had back-to-back [good] games.

"And the going into Chicago, knowing that they are extremely desperate and playing much better than their record indicates right now, especially at home. They've had some bad luck, a little bit of confidence has run out of them in certain areas of their game and they haven't been able to get that win, but they've been playing pretty well. And to see the falloff from Winnipeg and Minnesota and then Chicago, my biggest disappointment was that we didn't respect the game.

"We respected the Chicago Blackhawks. I knew they were coming and tried to give it a heads up, but we weren't firm. We weren't committed in some areas and we got pushed off the puck very easily. When you get pushed off the puck and you lose races, you don't give yourself a chance to have the puck or to be able to do anything with it. This game is still a working man's game; it's working with the puck in the right areas and in the right way, and working without the puck in the right areas and in the right way. And if you do that - which I thought we did very well in Minnesota - there are not many teams that are consistently going to beat you when you play that way.

"The way we played [Saturday] night, I can guarantee you consistently that you will not win. That is a guarantee. And it starts with the small things. It starts with the individual battles, the want to have the puck or to get it back or deny [the opponent] your net or deny them space, and fight for your inches. It's still a work-type of game.

"Then you add some degree of intelligence and systematic play in there, and then you're in pretty good shape. But we didn't have any of that [Saturday] night. I know we do a [nightly internal] thing analytically, and we broke it down. It said it all.

"As a coach, I was extremely disappointed in our group performance because I was so looking forward to seeing that game keep rolling from the first two games on the trip. My biggest thing was the disappointment. By saying that, I do know the group and I know what they're capable of in terms of a response, so hopefully we have a real good response [Monday] and follow that up and go consistently down the road here."

Said Niskanen:

"Playing without it is simpler to fix. It's really about details and committing yourself to go hard within your job. There is a skill to defending, too, but a lot of it is just paying attention to how you play and going really hard. Now having said that, I think the better you move the puck, the easier it is to defend. You defend less, and you're defending from better positions. If you're having turnovers in the wrong areas it makes it really hard, because forwards are going the wrong way and defensemen don't have a gap, probably because you're thinking offense because you have the puck. Those are two of the areas that we've got to work to get better at. They're big areas."

"Our scoring recently has saved us a lot of mistakes. We're lucky to have really talented people here who can put the puck in the net. And that's a really good thing to have, but we're going to need more. Other facets of our game are going to have to improve to give us a chance at more consistent success. You play good teams, and if you have holes or cracks in how you play, they're going to find them. So it's important to identify what areas you need to improve and then really work at it, pay attention to it, and make it a focus."

In The Nets - Monday's matinee match against the Sabres is also the start of a set of back-to-back games for the Capitals, who return home to do laundry and host the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday night. With Braden Holtby likely to face the Lightning in the District on Tuesday, we expect Philipp Grubuaer to get the start on Monday in Buffalo.

Grubauer will be making his 16th start of the season and he'll be seeking his sixth victory of 2017-18. He started and lost in Washington's previous visit to Western New York this season, coming out on the short end of a 3-1 decision here on Nov. 7. He stopped 32 shots to win his most recent start, a 5-2 win over the Wild in Minnesota on Thursday.

Lifetime against the Sabres, Grubauer is 2-1-2 with a 1.23 GAA and a .954 save pct.

With Robin Lehner now on the sidelines with a lower body injury, the Sabres have recalled Linus Ullmark from AHL Rochester. We're expecting Ullmark to back up for Chad Johnson, the Sabres' likely starter on Monday against Washington.

Johnson is 4-9-3 in 22 appearances this season, with a 3.48 GAA and an .888 save pct. Lifetime against Washington, Johnson is 2-2-1 with a 2.58 GAA and a .920 save pct.

All Lined Up - Here's how we expect the Capitals and the Sabres to look when they take the ice on Monday afternoon at KeyBank Center:

WASHINGTONForwards

8-Ovechkin, 19-Backstrom, 43-Wilson

13-Vrana, 92-Kuznetsov, 77-Oshie

10-Connolly, 20-Eller, 65-Burakovsky

18-Stephenson, 83-Beagle, 25-Smith-Pelly

Defensemen

29-Djoos, 74-Carlson

9-Orlov, 2-Niskanen

44-Orpik, 22-Bowey

Goaltenders

70-Holtby

31-Grubauer

Scratches

4-Chorney

39-Chiasson

Injured

None

BUFFALOForwards

9-Kane, 90-O'Reilly, 23-Reinhart

67-Pouliot, 71-Rodrigues, 21-Okposo

20-Wilson, 22-Larsson, 29-Pominville

28-Girgensons, 10-Josefson, 17-Nolan

Defensemen

82-Beaulieu, 55-Ristolainen

6-Scandella, 8-Nelson

41-Falk, 93-Antipin

Goaltenders

31-Johnson

35-Ullmark

Scratches

4-Gorges

13-Baptiste

Injuries

15-Eichel (high ankle sprain)

19-McCabe (thumb)

40-Lehner (lower body)

47-Bogisian (lower body)