Caps Come Home to Host Hawks
Chicago comes to the District to supply the opposition for the Capitals' annual Thanksgiving Eve home game
After a week out on the road, the Caps are back home and set to host their annual Thanksgiving Eve home game against the Chicago Blackhawks. Washington won two straight overtime games to finish the road trip, and it will be seeking to halt a two-game slide on home ice when it hosts the Hawks on Wednesday.
Washington's road trip got off to a good start last Tuesday in Minnesota when Tom Wilson returned to the Caps' lineup four games ahead of schedule. A fresh and fully charged Wilson helped the Caps to a 5-2 win that night, but adversity was just around the corner in Winnipeg.
When the Caps arrived in Manitoba's capital city on Wednesday, defenseman Michal Kempny took ill and missed the game, and goalie Braden Holtby suffered an upper body injury on the morning of the game, forcing Pheonix Copley to start for the second straight game while local amateur Gavin McHale suited up as Copley's understudy. The Caps lost that game 3-1, but they also lost stalwart top six forwards Evgeny Kuznetsov and T.J. Oshie to upper body injuries.
Playing without Holtby, Kuznetsov and Oshie, the Caps forged a 3-2, come-from-behind overtime win over Colorado in Denver on Friday. Nicklas Backstrom supplied the game-winner just 22 seconds into the extra session of that game, giving Copley his fourth win in a span of five starts.
The Caps got Holtby back on Monday in Montreal, but opted to go with Copley as the starter; he had allowed exactly two goals in four straight starts, winning three of them. But when Montreal erupted for three goals in a span of just 75 seconds early in the second period to take a 4-2 lead, Caps coach Todd Reirden made the switch, pulling Copley for the first time in his NHL career, and installing Holtby in relief for the first time since Nov. 29, 2014.
"It was a situation where I thought Copley was playing really well going into the game," says Caps coach Todd Reirden. "I wanted to put him back out there [Monday]. I didn't think he played poorly [Monday]; we had to change the momentum of the game. Ideally, I wouldn't have had to play Braden, but sometimes your plan has to change."
Holtby stopped all 22 shots he faced to earn his first relief win in more than six years, Alex Ovechkin scored twice and Lars Eller sent the Caps home happy from the road when he beat former teammate Carey Price at 3:34 of overtime to finish off Washington's come-from-behind win.
"I thought [Holtby] was great when he came in," says Reirden. "He looked really solid; he really settled things down for us and changed the momentum of the game. That's what you have to do sometimes."
Despite playing without Kuznetsov and Oshie in both games, the Caps have won consecutive overtime games on the same road trip for the first time in franchise history. Both forwards are day-to-day, and the Caps announced on Tuesday that defenseman Brooks Orpik has undergone arthroscopic surgery on his right knee, and he will miss the next four-to-six weeks. Orpik has been sidelined since Oct. 27.
Washington enters Wednesday's game having lost two straight at home. The Caps dropped the last two games of a five-game homestand before their recently completed road trip, and they scored just two goals in those two losses. The Caps have not dropped three straight games in regulation at home since October of 2017, when they lost three straight one-game homestands during a disjointed pacth of scheduling early last season.
After getting out to a strong 6-2-2 start on the season, the Hawks have fallen on hard times. An eight-game slide (0-6-2) cost coach Joel Quenneville - the coach for all three of Chicago's Stanley Cup championships in this decade - his job earlier this month. The Blackhawks promoted AHL Rockford coach Jeremy Colliton to replace Quenneville, and the 33-year-old Collliton instantly became the youngest coach in the league.
Chicago surrendered four or more goals in six of seven games during that aforementioned losing streak, but the Hawks have tightened up some since then, and they're on a mini roll as they come into Washington on Wednesday for the opener of a three-game road trip.
The Hawks have earned points in four straight games (2-0-2), and they've limited the opposition to two or fewer goals in regulation time of all four contests. Chicago has scored seven goals while allowing just five in those last four games, and goaltender Corey Crawford has allowed just two goals in his last three starts, going 2-0-1 in the process.
Since the start of November, the Hawks are 2-4-2. They've scored a total of just 13 goals in those eight games, and they've managed only nine goals at five-on-five over that stretch.
