The Capitals will travel to First Niagara Center for the 3rd game of their 5 game road swing, against the Sabres on Tuesday night. Puck drop is scheduled for 7:30pm.
Last in the Eastern Conference, the Sabres are playing the Caps in the 2nd game of a back to back set. Before getting shutout by the Penguins last night, the Sabres beat the red hot St. Louis Blues on Saturday which ended the Blues 8 game winning streak. The Sabres have lost 6 of their last 7 matchups. Although Ryan Miller has been excellent against the Caps this season, he played last night against the Pens so he may receive a rest. If he does, the Caps will face Sabres backup goalie, Jhonas Enroth. On the season, Enroth has a 1-10-4 record with a 2.67 GAA and .910 Save %. If the Sabres decide to go back to Miller due to his two excellent performances against the Caps this season, he has a 13-20-3 record with a 2.61 GAA and a .926 Save %. Buffalo has won both games against the Caps this season in the Shootout and in both matches combined, Miller has stopped 77 of 79 shots and hasn't given up a single shootout goal. Who would you play if you were the Sabres coach? (HA!)
The Caps are coming off of a 5-0 win against the Montreal Canadiens, which saw them break a 7 game losing streak. Goals were scored by Ovechkin, Erskine, Wellman, Carlson and Beagle. The Caps have recalled Center Ryan Stoa from Hershey and it makes us wonder what the status is on Brooks Laich who is coming off of a "Maintenance Day" (although Laich did skate this morning.) The Caps will once again be without Center Mikhail Grabovski who is out with a lower-body injury.
As reported by Katie Carrera of Capitals Insider, Caps lines at this mornings skate were: Johansson-Backstrom-Ovi, Erat-Laich-Brouwer, Chimera-Beagle-Wilson, Fehr-Volpatti-Wellman-Stoa and Ward as a group. One would wonder why the world Erat is still in the lineup considering he has no goals on the season and only 1 total goal in his Caps career.
It is unkown if the Caps will start Holtby or Neuvirth although we project Holtby to get the start after blanking the Canadiens his last game. For the season Holtby has a 14-12-2 record with a 2.90 GAA and .913 Save %. Neuvirth has a 3-5-1 record with a 2.79 GAA and a .915 Save %.
Time for the Caps to start racking up some points. Believe it or not, their only 3 points out of the final Eastern Conference playoff spot!
Zach's Three Keys to the Game:
Power Play goals: The Caps great powerplay has been awful as of late. They've only converted 1 of their last 32 attempts. If Miller is in net, the Caps are gonna have to make use of the man advantage and find a way to get some goals.
Discipline: The Caps need to stay out of the box in this one as their penalty kill has been rough recently. There's no excuse for losing to the Eastern Conferences worst team for a 3rd time in a row. Hopefully playing some disciplined hockey will help lead them to a W.
Secondary Scoring: We saw a flash of what the Caps can do last game when 5 different players scored goals against the Canadiens. They have to find a way to keep this up! Score Score Score!
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