March 27 vs. Minnesota Wild at Xcel Energy Center
Time: 7:30 p.m.
TV: MNMT, ESPN+, Hulu, Disney+
Radio: 106.7 THE FAN, Caps Radio 24/7
Washington Capitals (47-15-9)
Minnesota Wild (40-27-5)
The Caps conclude a two-game road trip on Thursday night in St. Paul when they take on the Minnesota Wild in the last regular season game Washington will play outside the Eastern Time Zone this season.
The trip began Tuesday night in Winnipeg, where the Jets quelled the Caps’ four-game winning streak with a 3-2 overtime victory. Washington is now 9-1-1 in its last 11 games.
Caps captain Alex Ovechkin notched goal No. 889 of his NHL career with four minutes remaining in Tuesday’s game, tying the game at 2-2 and ultimately securing a point for the Capitals in the process. Trevor van Riemsdyk started that scoring play with a heady pinch down the right-wing half wall, and he ultimately sparked the scoring play after losing his stick; he kicked the puck to Aliaksei Protas, who fed The Great Eight for the tying tally.
Initially, the goal was announced with a single assist to Protas, but shortly after the game, van Riemsdyk was also rightfully credited with a helper, pushing him to the 20-point plateau (one goal, 19 assists), and making him the sixth Washington defenseman to hit the double sawbuck level in points this season. It’s the first time in the Caps’ half-century history that they’ve had as many as six blueliners with 20 or more points in the same season.
“That’s the difference of us being aggressive there in that moment,” says Caps coach Spencer Carbery. “He is on his toes, he reads the situation well and keeps that puck alive and it ends up with us being able to tie that game, because even in the third period, going back through it, it wasn’t great. The first 10 or11 minutes, we actually gave up certainly significantly more than we generated. And [Logan Thompson] had to make a few big saves.
“We were back on our heels there a little bit in the third, so for us to get through that, and then TVR steps up and makes a huge play with the pinch, and then Pro to get that puck over to [Ovechkin], capitalizing there was able to get us a point out of the game.”
Beginning with his first goal in just over two years on March 15 in San Jose, van Riemsdyk now has four points (one goal, three assists) in his last five games, and he carries a three-game assist streak into Thursday’s game, matching his career best streak. This is the fourth time van Riemsdyk has strung together assists in three straight games in his 11-year NHL career, but he knows scoring goals is a bonus, and far from his primary responsibilities.
“I feel like – especially this year – I’ve played some of my best hockey,” says van Riemsdyk, whose 672 NHL games rank second only to John Carlson (1,080) among Washington defensemen. “I look back at the goals I’ve scored in my career – and it’s not that many [25] – and I’d say half of them are the type of thing where you’re trying to be aggressive, and you just throw one at the net, and it works. And half of them are probably from the blueline through a screen.
“Whatever it was – and I don’t know what it was – maybe our forwards are just too good at tipping pucks, so I never ended up with a goal. But if you had told me it had been a couple of years since I had scored, I’d be more stressed about it. I was happy with how I was playing and I know that I don’t measure my success on goals, and I don’t think the coaches do, either. They want me to be a reliable player and all that, but it is nice to score one.”
That goes for the assists, too. And every assist TVR adds to his total over the remainder of this season extends his career high.
Ovechkin carries a five-game point streak (three goals, four assists) into Thursday’s game with the Wild, matching his longest streak of the season. He did collect a point in seven straight games in which he played earlier in the campaign, but his 16-game absence with a broken leg was nestled within those seven games.
Xcel Energy Center has been kind to Ovechkin over the years; he picked up at least a point in each of his first dozen visits here, a streak that was snapped in a 5-3 loss here on Jan. 23, 2024. Ovechkin has had five-multi goal games in St. Paul, recording a pair of hat tricks and three two-goal games here, with four of the five coming in the month of March. As he chases down Gretzky’s record, Ovechkin has been remarkably consistent.
A year ago at this time, Ovechkin was in the midst of a four-game goal dry spell, but he hasn’t gone more than three games without a goal since. He has scored 41 goals in 63 games since that four-game drought late last season. Over the same time frame, only Edmonton’s Leon Draisaitl (51) has scored more goals than Ovechkin. Winnipeg’s Kyle Connor also has 41 goals over that span, but his 78 games played are 15 more than the Caps’ captain across that span.
Minnesota has been firmly in the Western Conference playoff picture for most of the season, but the Wild has been dealing with a spate of injuries as well.Minnesota has been playing without veteran forwards Kirill Kaprizov, Joel Eriksson Ek and Marcus Foligno, ad they just got blueliner Jonas Brodin back in their lineup for Tuesday’s home game with Vegas, a 5-1 setback.
The Wild will be seeking to avoid a third straight loss when it hosts the Caps on Thursday. The Wild is 4-5-1 in its last 10 games, but Minnesota has avoided lengthy losing spells this season. A four-game regulation slide in mid-December marks the only time Minnesota has failed to collect a point in as many as four straight games this season.
Standings wise, the Wild is fourth in the competitive Central Division, and it is still on reasonably good playoff footing as well. With seven consecutive victories, surging St. Louis is putting some backpressure on Minnesota for the first wild card playoff berth in the Western Conference. The Blues have pulled to within two points of Minnesota, which holds a game in hand on St. Louis. Minnesota is six points clear of Calgary – the nearest non-playoff team, currently – but the Flames hold two games in hand relative to the Wild.
