Calgary Round-Up – The Caps are in Calgary to face the Flames tonight, playing the penultimate game of their longest road journey of the season, a five-game, 12-day trip through Western Canada and the Pacific Northwest, with one final stop in the Eastern Time Zone on Thursday in Ottawa.
The Caps took two of the first three games on the trip, winning in Edmonton and Seattle before dropping a 2-1 decision to the Canucks in Vancouver on Saturday night. After a lengthy stay in Vancouver – and a Monday morning practice at Rogers Arena – the Caps flew into Calgary late Monday afternoon.
The Flames have been a bit busier than Washington of late; they’ll be playing their third game in four nights and their fourth game in six nights tonight when they host the Capitals to open a three-game homestand. Calgary will play just one of its next eight games on the road; the Flames travel to Seattle for a Feb. 2 date with the Kraken. Beyond that, Calgary’s next road game is in Washington on Feb. 25.
Like the Caps, the Flames are a surprise team in the NHL this season. Expected to be in a rebuilding mode, Calgary has gotten great goaltending from rookie netminder Dustin Wolf, a seventh-round choice (214th overall) from the 2019 NHL Draft. Wolf is 18-7-2 on the season, with a pair of shutouts, a 2.54 GAA and a .916 save pct.
Calgary allows an average of 29.3 shots on net per game, ninth most in the NHL, but Wolf’s solid play has helped the Flames mitigate that aspect of their game. Calgary doesn’t stand out in any of the League’s team stats, but Wolf gives the Flames a chance to win virtually every game he plays.
“[They’re a] hard-working team,” says Caps coach Spencer Carbery of the Flames. “I think the combination of [Jonathan] Huberdeau and [Nazem] Kadri and the chemistry that they have – especially recently – has been noticeable on film. Goaltending has been a strength for them for sure. Their home record and playing at the Saddledome has been impressive, their record here and how they’ve played.
“And I think maybe some similarities to our team. The outside world has written us off, [has written] Calgary off: ‘They’re not going to do XYZ.’ And I don’t know if guys listen to that, but just playing with a little bit of a chip on their shoulder of ‘we’ve got something to prove.’ And when you have that as a group and everybody believes in that and galvanizes around that of, ‘We’re not going to take a night off or a shift off,’ those teams are hard to handle in this League. And I feel like they have a little bit of that when you watch them play.”
Coming into Tuesday’s game against Calgary, the Caps have a streak of seven straight games in which they’ve yielded two or fewer goals against. It is Washington’s longest streak of that nature in almost 14 years (seven games from Feb. 26-March 11, 2011), and the team has had only five longer streaks in its half-century history.
The franchise standard is nine straight games, achieved only once, from Jan. 9-31, 1998.
Old Flame – Caps winger Andrew Mangiapane began his pro career in the Flames’ system, and he spent the first seven seasons of his NHL career here before coming to the Caps in a deal last June. A sixth-round (166th overall) choice in the 2015 NHL Draft, Mangiapane began his pro career in 2016-17 with AHL Stockton, putting up back-to-back 20-goal seasons and earning a brief midseason callup in 2017-18.
Mangiapane made his NHL debut at 21, skating against Chicago in a Dec. 31, 2017 game here at the Saddledome. The following season, he skated in 44 NHL games and he’s been here ever since. Mangiapane’s rise was a gradual one; he picked up his first career point – an assist – in his 19th NHL game, and scored his first NHL goal against Jakob Markstrom and the Canucks in Vancouver on Feb. 9, 2019.
“Calgary was great for me,” says Mangiapane. “It was honestly my second home, so going back should be exciting, and it should be a good game. I’m sure it’ll be a little weird being on the opposing side, but I’m sure my teammates here will all help me out and bring their ‘A’ game for us.”
Over his seven seasons in Calgary, Mangiapane amassed 119 goals and 113 assists for 232 points in 417 games, netting a career high of 35 goals in 2021-22. Including his 10 goals this season with the Caps, Mangiapane has stacked up six straight seasons with double-digit goal totals.
In The Nets – A day after signing a six-year, $35.1 million contract extension, Logan Thompson gets the net for the Caps in his hometown of Calgary. Thompson carries a personal 11-game point streak (10-0-1) into tonight’s game against the Flames.
Dating back to Nov. 2, Thompson has permitted two or fewer goals against in 18 of his last 22 starts. In his last five starts, he is 5-0-0 with two shutouts, a 0.79 GAA and a .969 save pct.
Lifetime against the Flames, he is 3-2-0 in five appearances – all starts – with a 2.68 GAA and a .924 save pct.
Wolf gets the net for Calgary tonight, and the Capitals will be seeing him for the second time. Wolf faced Washington when the Caps concluded their Western Canada road trip here on March 18 of last year, a 5-2 Caps victory in which Wolf was reached for four goals on 32 shots while Charlie Lindgren stopped 34 of 36 at the opposite end of the ice.
All Lined Up – Here’s how we believe the Capitals and Flames might look on Tuesday night in Calgary:
WASHINGTON
Forwards
8-Ovechkin, 17-Strome, 43-Wilson
21-Protas, 80-Dubois, 24-McMichael
16-Raddysh, 20-Eller, 53-Frank
22-Duhaime, 26-Dowd, 88-Mangiapane
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)
CALGARY
Forwards
10-Huberdeau, 91-Kadri, 22-Pelletier
20-Coleman, 11-Backlund, 27-Coronato
96-Kuzmenko, 17-Sharangovich, 76-Pospisil
70-Lomberg, 61-Bishop, 43-Klapka
Defensemen
44-Hanley, 4-Andersson
24-Bean, 52-Weegar
8-Barrie, 94-Pachal
Goaltenders
32-Wolf
80-Vladar
Extras
21-Rooney
62-Miromanov
Out/Injured
7-Bahl (undisclosed)
39-Mantha (lower body)
47-Zary (lower body)
58-Kirkland (lower body)