Carolina Hurricanes at Washington Capitals: Lineups and Game Discussion

There are a couple teams that have had the Canes’ number this year (Florida, Ottawa, Dallas), but maybe none more so than Washington.

Carolina is 0-3-1 against the Caps so far this season, with a 4-2 and 4-0 regulation loss followed by a 4-3 shootout loss the last time out.

The Canes will be in D.C. Monday night looking to avoid the season sweep and also looking to build on some momentum from a 7-2 win over the Blues.

Carolina has a couple guys who seem to be getting hot. Sebastian Aho and Teuvo Teravainen are both on three-game point streaks, while Seth Jarvis has two multi-goal games in the last couple weeks. Martin Necas is starting to score again, and the goalies are, of course, playing well.

As for the Caps, they’ve won two straight and have won 9 of their 12 games in the month of March. Washington is firmly in control of a wildcard spot, 15 points clear of Columbus who sits in third. The Caps are fighting Boston for the top wildcard spot, and with the Canes’ lead in the Metro fairly comfortable, there’s a decent chance it could be Washington-Carolina in the first round of the playoffs this year.

With that in mind, it’ll be interesting to see how the Canes finish out the season series Monday night. Granted, the regular season games are meaningless when it comes playoff time, but it would at least be good to see the Hurricanes show that Washington isn’t complete Kryptonite.

Anyway, here’s how the teams are expected to line up:

Carolina Hurricanes

Teuvo Teravainen - Sebastian Aho - Seth Jarvis
Andrei Svechnikov - Vincent Trocheck - Martin Necas
Nino Niederreiter - Jordan Staal - Jesper Fast
Max Domi - Jesperi Kotkaniemi - Derek Stepan

Jaccob Slavin - Tony DeAngelo
Brady Skjei - Brett Pesce
Brendan Smith - Ian Cole

Frederik Andersen
Antti Raanta

Injuries and Scratches: Steven Lorentz (healthy), Jordan Martinook (lower body), Ethan Bear (lower body)

Washington Capitals

Alex Ovechkin - Evgeny Kuznetsov - Tom Wilson
Anthony Mantha - Nicklas Backstrom - T.J. Oshie
Conor Sheary - Connor McMichael - Marcus Johansson
Axel Johnsson-Fjallby - Lars Eller - Garnet Hathaway

Martin Fehervary - John Carlson
Dmitry Orlov - Nick Jensen
Michal Kempny - Justin Schultz

Vitek Vanecek
Ilya Samsonov

Injuries and Scratches: Matt Irwin (healthy), Joe Snively (upper body), Carl Hagelin (eye), Trevor van Riemsdyk (upper body), Johan Larsson (lower body), Nic Dowd (upper body)