November 3 vs. Carolina Hurricanes at Lenovo Center
Time: 5:00 p.m.
TV: MNMT
Radio: 106.7 The Fan, Caps Radio 24/7
Washington Capitals (8-2-0)
Carolina Hurricanes (7-2-0)
The Caps conclude their second set of back-to-back games this season late Sunday afternoon in Raleigh when they take on the Carolina Hurricanes. Sunday’s game is the first of four meetings between the two Metropolitan Division rivals this season.
Washington took care of business on the front end of the back-to-back games, striking for five goals in the first period to roll to a 7-2 win over the Columbus Blue Jackets on Saturday at Capital One Arena. Saturday’s triumph was Washington’s sixth straight on home ice, and it marks the Caps’ longest home winning streak since a 10-game spree in 2017-18. The Caps come to Carolina with a three-game winning streak overall.
Aliaksei Protas and Connor McMichael continued to display hot scoring hands; those two scored on Washington’s first two shots on net of the night. Both scored on short-ice 2-on-1 rushes; Protas at the 56-second mark of the first, and McMichael at 1:42.
When Andrew Mangiapane scored to make it 3-0 at 7:28 of the first, Caps’ goaltender Logan Thompson had all the offense he would need to record his fifth win in as many starts since coming to Washington in a late June trade with Vegas.
Alex Ovechkin kept the party going; he scored four times on the three-game homestand, giving him six goals on the season and 859 for his NHL career. McMichael scored his second goal of the game in the second period, and Nic Dowd and Dylan Strome completed the Washington scoring parade.
Ten games into what has been a terrific start to the season for the Capitals, they continue to astound with their offensive performance. They’ve scored four or more goals in seven of the 10 games, and they’ve erupted for five or more goals in five of their last seven games. Washington’s five-goal first frame was its eighth period this season with three or more goals; it had 16 such periods all of last season, and its eighth one came on Jan. 2 of this year in Pittsburgh, in the Capitals’ 35th contest of the campaign.
But the Caps have also been impressive at the defensive end of the ice. Going into Saturday’s game, the Caps were the stingiest team in the League in terms of shots on goal permitted. They held the Jackets to just five shots in a dominant first period, but Columbus poured 31 shots on Thompson in the game’s final 40 minutes, including 20 in the middle period.
Washington skaters combined to block a season-high total of 30 shots on the night, including a dozen in the first period.
“The first period, we couldn’t have drawn it up any better as a team,” says Thompson. “Second period, we knew they were going to have a push, and credit to them; those guys didn’t give up. That’s a hard-working team, the way they’re coached and the way they come out. They had no quit tonight.”
Averaging 4.40 goals per game on the season, the Caps rank third in the NHL in that department, trailing Winnipeg (4.73) and Vegas (4.50). Washington scored five goals in its homestand opener against the Rangers, then increased that total by one in each subsequent game of the homestand.
Now the Capitals face a Carolina club that is scoring 3.89 goals per game (sixth in NHL) while yielding an average of just 2.33 goals against per game (second).
“I think it's just another game,” says Strome. “I don't think you put too much stock into it; there’s 82 throughout the season. Obviously, it’s a little different playing on a back-to-back. You can tell [the difference] tonight from Columbus to us, and we’ve got to find a way to weather their storm [Sunday]. We know they come out hard in their rink.
“Each team has to play a certain amount of back-to-backs, and that's part of the job. It’s on us to find a way to recreate some momentum like we had in the first period [vs. Columbus] tomorrow, and not let them do it to us. It's going to be a huge part of the game.”
While the Caps have roared out to an 8-2-0 start largely on the strength of their 6-1 home record, the Hurricanes 2-1-0 record at home matches Washington’s road record for the season. Carolina has rolled out to a strong 7-2 start by cruising to a 5-1-0 mark in its first half dozen road contests.
“It’s going to be huge,” says McMichael of the Sunday skirmish with the Canes. “It’s a really hard building to play in and they’re obviously off to a really good start. For us, I think it’s come out like we did today and just play our game. The games this year where we’ve been at our best is when we’re dictating the play; we’re forcing the play how we want to. And it’s not going to change [Sunday] with Carolina.
“We know they’re a high-volume team with pucks to the net and creating chaos in front of the net. For us, it’s just going to be [about creating offensive] zone time, hanging onto pucks, and making smart reads.”
While the Caps are bringing a modest three-game winning streak into Sunday’s game, the Hurricanes have won five straight, outscoring the opposition by a combined 23-10 in the process. While the Caps are playing for the second time in as many nights, Carolina has been cooling its collective heels since administering a thorough 8-2 beating on the Boston Bruins on Wednesday. Carolina struck for four goals in the first period of that game to win going away; the last three of those first-period markers came in a span of just 52 seconds.
The Capitals and the Hurricanes split their four meetings last season, and they split their two home games against one another as well. Washington was last in Raleigh on April 5 when it dropped a 4-2 decision to Carolina. The two teams hooked up in a barnburner in the District a couple of weeks earlier; the Caps eked out a 7-6 shootout victory in that game on March 22 of this year.
