Los Angeles Kings v Washington Capitals (wherever the Washington Capitals play the sport of ice hockey)
Time: 4:00 PM
TV: Fox Sports West
Enemy reading: Japers Rink
Caps (projected) lineup:
Johansson-Beagle-Ovechkin
Kuznetsov-Backstrom-Brouwer
Chimera-Fehr-Ward
Penner-Brown-Wilson
Alzner-Carlson
Hillen-Green
Orlov-Wey
Halak
Injured: Brooks Laich, John Erskine, Mikhail Garovski, Aaron Volpatti; Scratched: Connor Carrick
Kings (projected) lineup:
Gaborik-Kopitar-Williams
Pearson-Toffoli-Carter
King-Stoll-Brown
Clifford-Richards-Lewis
Muzzin-Doughty
Regehr-Voynov
Mitchell-Martinez
Quick
Injured: n/a; Scratched: Matt Greene, Jordan Nolan
Game Notes:
•Oh hey! The Kings are playing today?!
•Well Jaroslav Halak is coming back from an injured groin. So the Kings strategy tonight should obviously be to repeatedly shoot pucks directly at his groin. He actually has performed much better than Ryan Miller post-deadline. He’s posted a .935 sv% in Washington (Miller’s is .916 in St. Louis).
•The Kings have been dominant coming back from the break, but they still like to make things exciting by getting goals waved off and giving up leads in the third period. Not sure if I can handle too many more of these.
• On the other hand, Sutter doesn’t seem worried:
“Sutter, on whether he liked Los Angeles’ pace last night:
Yeah, I thought it was probably the best second period we’ve played on the road this year. I thought we were a little bit unlucky at the end of the day. We probably should’ve had a three or four goal lead.”
Sutter is a man after JftC’s heart these days.
• Alec Martinez has 9 points in his last 11 games. His 9 goals lead Kings defensemen. #Martinez4Norris
• ~Fun with Numbers~ from Extra Skater. Well the Kings and Caps seem to be teams heading in opposite directions. The Caps usage chart is a total mess. I’ve never seen one that looked that crazy.
•Prediction: Kings win 9-2, because I don’t feel like being stressed out tonight.