Walk On The Wild Side – The Caps open the 2025 portion of their 2024-25 schedule against the visiting Minnesota Wild tonight, the first of eight Western Conference opponents they will face among their 14 January games. The Wild will be without superstar winger Kirill Kaprizov and captain Jared Spurgeon; both players are currently sidelined with lower body injuries.
The Wild has earned at least a point in 16 of its first 19 road games (13-3-3) this season, and Minnesota’s road record is easily the best in the NHL. The Wild’s road point pct. of .763 is well ahead of that of second-place Vancouver (.688).
“They check really well; they make it really difficult,” says Caps coach Spencer Carbery of the Wild. “Similar to a Boston team, they’re going to make it really difficult on you being able to find any space – they always have numbers above – so we’re going to have to work extremely hard to create not only offensive zone time, but just to be able to penetrate and find ways to get to their net.”
Squeezing Out Sparks – Washington’s December record of 8-4-1 wasn’t quite as stellar as its October (7-2-0) or November (10-4-1) bodies of work, but it was tied for the eighth best mark in the circuit last month. And given the fact that the Caps were 26th in the NHL in December scoring with an average of 2.62 goals per game and that they ranked 30th in the League with just 21 goals at 5-on-5 last month, their record last month is remarkable.
The two teams that finished December with fewer goals at 5-on-5 are San Jose (18) and the New York Rangers (17). The Sharks were 2-10-1 last month and the Rangers were 3-10-0.
Washington was reliant on a staunch team defense and some consistently strong and clutch goaltending to keep the points coming in last month. The Caps yielded only 2.08 goals per game last month, the fourth best rate in the NHL. And although they only scored 21 goals at 5-on-5 in December, the Capitals yielded even fewer (19). Excluding empty-net goals against, Washington also allowed only seven third-period goals in its 13 games last month, the fourth-lowest total in the League, and tied for the lowest among all Eastern Conference clubs.
The Caps may not be playing to their own lofty standards at the moment, but they’re finding ways of winning games and they’ve kept a steady stream of points coming in throughout the season’s first half.
“We don’t always pay attention to all of those stats,” says Caps winger Tom Wilson. “As a group in here, we expect to win every night. Every game looks different, and hockey is a game of mistakes; some nights, you’re not going to have your best game, and you’ve got to find ways to get it done.
“For the most part this year, we’ve shown that we’re a team with resiliency and culture that expects to win. And in those tight games, you just figure it out in that moment. You step up, or guys make big plays, and you get it done.”
Like all pro sports, hockey is a results-based business/game, and there is obviously inherent value in finding different ways of coming out on top on the scoreboard as the season wears on. Coaches are always going to concern themselves mainly with the process, but it’s ultimately results that keep them employed.
Coming out of its three-day holiday break, Washington played three games in less than 72 hours to finish December, winning two of them. But Carbery wasn’t thrilled with his team’s play in any of those three contests.
“We don’t have the puck enough,” says the Caps’ bench boss. “And when you don’t have the puck enough and when teams are out-possessing you, I find that we are defending way more than we were at the beginning of the year. The amount of defensive zone shifts where we have to just get a puck out and then we just change [has increased]. It’s a simple way of saying we need to possess the puck more. Now, what goes into that? A lot of different stuff, of us being able to manage it better, of us being able to find [defensive] zone exits when we have possession and it’s on our stick.
“Not to oversimplify it, but if there was one thing … it’s because we are checking way too often and do not have the puck enough.”
Washington is playing more in its own end than it would like, it doesn’t have the puck as much as it did earlier in the season, and it hasn’t been as good with the puck when it does have it. But the wins and the points keep coming, which is important as the Caps aim to shore up the areas of their game they perceive as sagging.
“Obviously, you want to be controlling games,” says Wilson. “You want to have the stats and then analytics by your side. But it’s not always that simple. We want to win games, and at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter how you do it. You’ve just got to be as consistent as you can throughout the whole year.”
The Caps have been consistent. They have yet to go more than two games without collecting a point, and they are – along with the Winnipeg Jets – one of only two teams that enters the 2025 portion of the schedule in the top five in both average goals per game and average goals against per game.
“I think that probably starts with our back end,” says Caps center Nic Dowd. “The six guys that play on any given night – and that includes the who are out of the lineup right now, because those defensemen have stepped in and played really well, and they could [do so] on any given night – are playing really, really well. And that makes it easy on us forwards to get out of the [defensive] zone and get into the [offensive] zone and play where you want to play. The more time you spend down there, the luckier bounces you’re going to get, the more goals you’re going to score, and the less goals you’re going to give up.
“And then, when something has gone wrong, our goalies have played really, really well. They take those mistakes and they kind of get washed away from the memory bank, and people don’t think about them because the puck didn’t go in. But I do think our [defense] corps has played very, very well, and the six that are in there – I would say – are the top six in the NHL.”
Those six defensemen – John Carlson, Jakob Chychrun, Martin Fehervary, Matt Roy, Rasmus Sandin and Trevor van Riemsdyk – have been in the lineup together continuously for nearly two months now, a span of 24 straight games. During that stretch of two dozen games, the Caps are 16-6-2, the third-best mark in the League, and they’ve yielded just 2.38 goals against per game, also third-best in the League. Washington blocked 16.78 shots per 60 minutes last month, the best rate in the Eastern Conference, and fourth in the NHL.
“I think we can get back to our game a little bit more,” says Wilson. “At the beginning of the year, we were playing really well with the puck. But that being said, we’re finding ways to win, which is the most important part through the dog days of the season, when it gets to December, January, and February. You’ve just got to keep collecting wins.”
The 500 Club – Tonight against the Wild, Caps defenseman Jakob Chychrun plays in the 500th game of his NHL career. Chychrun, who is still about three months shy of his 27th birthday on March 31, becomes the third defenseman from his 2016 NHL Draft class to reach the milestone, following Colorado’s Sam Girard (513) and Utah’s Mikhail Sergachev (512).
Chychrun made his NHL debut as an 18-year-old, and he has never played a game in the minors. In the last 40 NHL seasons, only nine defensemen have played more games in the League as a teenager than Chychrun’s 116. Doug Bodger (144) tops the list, followed by Rasmus Dahlin (141), Kyle McLaren (132) and Chychrun’s uncle, Luke Richardson (130). Richardson’s career total of 1,417 games ranks 12th all-time among defensemen.
If not for a few injuries along the way – not to mention the pandemic – Chychrun might have well over 600 games in the League by now.
“In the moment, you're just doing everything you can to stick around and be there for the guys and contribute however you can at a young age,” says Chychrun. “We had a great team [in Arizona] back then. Lots of guys were very supportive my first year; I was playing with Shane Doan and just some legends of the game. Those were really, really special moments where I could see how those guys were approaching the game. Doaner was 40 years old at the time, and we all looked up to him a lot; he was great for the young guys, and he made us just feel very at home.
“But going into the league at a young age, you just feel like it's a whirlwind. Every night, you're playing against some of your idols, and for Doaner to help you just relax and settle in a little bit was awesome.
“But time flies in this league. And that was, you know, the message Mike Smith always preached; [he was] our goalie back then – was you can't just say, ‘Oh, next year we'll make the playoffs, or ‘Next year we'll have a chance to win.’ You can't take any day for granted in this league, because you blink and for me, it's my ninth season already. It's just crazy how fast it goes by, and you really do need to cherish the opportunities you have with a group like this, where we have really good team, and we could come together and do something special, because you don't have many opportunities.”
In The Nets – Charlie Lindgren takes aim at his 11th win of the season tonight against Minnesota. After being nicked for four first-period goals on Sunday in Detroit in his most recent start, Lindgren closed the door the rest of the way, stopping each of the last 17 shots he faced. In his six December starts, Lindgren was 3-3-0 with a 2.18 GAA and a .914 save pct.
Lifetime against the Wild, Lindgren is seeking his first victory against his home state team. In three career starts and appearances against Minnesota, Lindgren is 0-3-0 with a 3.49 GAA and an .895 save pct.
Future Hall of Fame goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury gets the net for the Wild on Thursday night. Fleury is on his NHL farewell tour this season, his 21st and final one in the League. Fleury’s last season with 30 or more victories was 2018-19 when he went 35-21-5 for Vegas in the second season of then Golden Knights’ existence, but the 40-year-old has managed an impressive 101-67-16 overall record since, while gradually decreasing his workload as his retirement draws closer.
With 567 career victories, Fleury ranks second only to Martin Brodeur (691). Among all active NHL goaltenders only two – Florida’s Sergei Bobrovsky (413) and the Rangers’ Jonathan Quick (398) – are within 200 victories of Fleury’s remarkable career total.
Tonight’s game marks Fleury’s 47th career appearance against Washington and his 46th career start against the Capitals. He owns a 27-14-3 career mark with four shutouts, a 2.64 GAA and a .912 save pct. against the Caps.
For every Fleury win against Washington over the years, there has been an Alex Ovechkin goal against Fleury. The Caps captain has played in 46 of Fleury's 47 games against his team, and Ovechkin has netted 27 of his 870 career goals against the venerable goaltender, the most he has scored against any of his 178 unique victims.
All Lined Up – Here’s how we believe the Caps and the Wild might look on Thursday night in the District:
WASHINGTON
Forwards
8-Ovechkin, 17-Strome, 21-Protas
24-McMichael, 80-Dubois, 43-Wilson
88-Mangiapane, 20-Eller, 63-Miroshnichenko
22-Duhaime, 26-Dowd, 16-Raddysh
Defensemen
38-Sandin, 74-Carlson
42-Fehervary, 3-Roy
6-Chychrun, 57-van Riemsdyk
Goaltenders
48-Thompson
79-Lindgren
Extras
13-Vrana
27-Alexeyev
52-McIlrath
Out/Injured
15-Milano (upper body)
19-Backstrom (hip)
77-Oshie (back)
MINNESOTA
Forwards
12-Boldy, 23-Rossi, 63-Zuccarello
90-Johansson, 14-Eriksson-Ek, 38-Hartman
17-Foligno, 89-Gaudreau, 13-Trenin
19-Shore, 22-Khusnutdinov, 39-Jones
Defensemen
25-Brodin, 7-Faber
47-Chisholm, 24-Bogosian
4-Merrill, 44-Dermott
Goaltenders
29-Fleury
32-Gustavsson
Extras
21-Gaunce
71-Lambos
Out/Injured
5-Middleton (hand)
46-Spurgeon (lower body)
94-Lauko (lower body)
97-Kaprizov (lower body)
