Dec. 28 vs. Toronto Maple Leafs at Scotiabank Arena
Time: 7:00 p.m.
TV: MNMT
Radio: 106.7 THE FAN, Caps Radio 24/7
Washington Capitals (23-9-2)
Toronto Maple Leafs (21-12-2)
Following the NHL’s three-day holiday break and a Friday reorientation/practice session at MedStar Capitals Iceplex, the Caps will pick up where they left off before the break, and that’s on the road. The Caps head to Toronto for a weekend set of back-to-back games. After facing the Maple Leafs on Saturday, the Caps head to the Motor City for a late Sunday afternoon tilt with the Detroit Red Wings.
Saturday’s game against the Maple Leafs is the middle match of a three game-road swing for Washington, which entered the break on the heels of a 4-1 loss to the Bruins in Boston on Monday night. The Caps entered the third period of that game all even at 1-1, but they had nothing going on offensively against the stingy Bruins, who struck for a trio of late tallies to hand Washington just its second loss of the season by a margin of three or more goals.
Caps captain Alex Ovechkin and center Lars Eller were both full participants in Friday’s practice session. Neither player has been definitively cleared to play on Saturday in Toronto, though both players are on the trip and both could play Saturday, but only if they’re cleared to do so by the Capitals medical staff.
“We will see, we will see,” says Caps coach Spencer Carbery. “Things are trending in the right direction for people. Another step for [Ovechkin]; I cannot say that he is in the lineup [Saturday], we’ll have to wait and see how he responds to practice today and then we’ll know [Saturday] morning.
“Once we knew he wasn’t going to play in the LA game and the Boston game [before the break], this practice was circled for full contact drills, where there’s nine players moving around. So him taking part in that, we knew that this was going to be a big box for him to check on his way back.”
Eller missed three games with an illness, but his status for Saturday is also uncertain as of now.
“He practiced today in full, which is a positive sign,” says Carbery. “So we’ll see [Saturday]. He’s sort of in the same boat as [Ovechkin].”
Every team in the NHL had three dark days with no team activities for the holidays, but the Caps also have the rare luxury of not having to play a game in their first day after the break, though they obviously do jump back in with another set of back-to-backs.
“First time ever, I think,” says Caps defenseman John Carlson. “[P-L] Dubois was saying he got up, packed his bag and came to the rink expecting that we were playing tonight, just like we would [typically]. And yeah, I don't know if we've ever done this. We're always playing the day after [the holiday break]. I would say it definitely is a big luxury, and I think we had a good practice. And obviously after three days off, it's not going to be perfect. But I was pretty happy with the [holiday] schedule and how it broke down this year.”
Carlson is correct. For the first time in Washington’s half century franchise history, the Caps do not have a game scheduled on either Dec. 26 or 27. (Washington didn’t play any games from Dec. 20-28 in 2021, but it had a few games postponed during that period because of a COVID outbreak, including a home date scheduled vs. Ottawa on Dec. 27 of that season/year.) These days, the NHL’s holiday break encompasses three days: Dec. 24-26. But not so long ago, games were played on Dec. 26. The Caps played on Dec. 26 as recently as 2019, when they defeated the Canadiens at home the day after Christmas.
Typically, the Caps are either playing at home the day immediately after the holiday break – whether that’s the 26th or the 27th – or they’re having a quick and early morning skate at home before traveling on the day of the game to play on the first possible day after the break.
This year, they have the luxury of a full practice at home along with a leisurely day of travel, plus a full morning skate on Saturday in Toronto before they jump back into the 2024-25 season.
“Hopefully, we can use it to our advantage,” says Carbery. “Toronto plays Detroit [Friday night], so we’ll get [the Maple Leafs] on a back-to-back and Detroit will get us on the back-to-back [Sunday]. It’s always tricky; you’re trying to get your team as prepared as possible in a small amount of time, whether that’s meetings, pre-scouts, practice time, or managing their physical preparation, having just been off for three days, and probably consuming a lot of calories for three days and not doing a whole lot, which is great, because I think it’s important mentally.
“But now, getting back into game mode is always really the challenge of who can do that at a higher level coming out of the break.”
It’s something the Caps will seek to improve upon from last season when they went 5-10-2 in their first 17 games coming out of the holiday break.
“Hopefully, we can hit the ground running [Saturday] night, use this practice to sort of catapult us into being able to get back to our game right away in Toronto,” says Carbery. “This portion of the season is interesting; I was looking at it over the break.
“You can split the season into three parts. You've got the 34 games that we just played – almost half the season – and then you have Christmas break, deep breath, and now we've got 21 games in 44 days before the Four Nations [tournament in February]. Sort of like your middle portion of the season, and then the final push. So these 21 [games] in 44 [nights] is our middle where I feel like we can really help ourselves out as a team and set us up for the final push. And we go out to Western Canada as part of this; we don’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves. It’s a good, strong 44 days and 21 games that will be really important for our team and for our group.”
Just over three weeks ago, Washington won a 3-1 decision over the Leafs in Toronto, a Dec. 6 game that was also the front end of a set of back-to-backs for the Capitals. Anthony Stolarz had the net for the Leafs in that game here earlier in the month, but he is now recuperating from a lower body ailment and won’t be in the Toronto lineup; the same is true of Leafs captain Auston Matthews, who is expected to miss both Leafs games this weekend with an upper body injury.
The Leafs entered the holiday break on the heels of a two-game skid on home ice, falling to the New York Islanders on Dec. 21 and to the Winnipeg Jets two nights later.
Along with the Capitals, the Leafs are one of two NHL teams that has an NHL high nine sets of back-to-back games between opening night of the 2024-25 season and New Year’s Eve. Toronto flew to Detroit to provide the opposition for Todd McLellan’s debut as the Red Wings’ bench boss on Friday night, so the Caps will catch the Leafs on the second night of back-to-backs while the Wings will catch Washington in the same situation on Sunday.
