Who:
Pittsburgh Penguins (2-1-0, 4 points, 2nd place Metropolitan Division) @ Washington Capitals (1-1-0, 2 points, 5th place Metropolitan Division)When: 7:30 p.m. eastern
How to Watch: Nationally televised game on TNT, streaming on HBO Max
Pens’ Path Ahead: The Pens stay on the road and head over to Columbus on Friday, then return home to meet Dallas at PPG Paints on Saturday night. After that is a long road trip next week, tonight marks the start for five of the next six contests being on the road.
Opponent Track: Washington played two times in two days and nothing since so far this season. The Caps put a walloping on Carolina by a 5-2 score on Friday, then dropped a game on Saturday when Jake Guentzel hit an empty netter to push Tampa to a 3-1 win.
Season Series: It’s the first last time for Crosby and Malkin vs. Ovechkin. The Pens and Caps meet tonight, then the last chances to see the Great 8 in Pittsburgh (in the regular season, anyways) are coming up on January 18th and March 13th. The Pens go back to Washington all the way on April 4th, which marks the final home game of the regular season for the Capitals.
Hidden Stat: The Penguins are one of just six teams in the league that have yet to allow a power-play goal against (TOR, STL, COL, MIN, UTA), per Penguins PR.
Getting to know the Capitals
Projected lines
FORWARDS
Alex Ovechkin – Dylan Strome – Anthony Beauvillier
Alex Tuch – Pierre-Luc Dubois – Tom Wilson
Aliaksei Protas- Ilya Protas – Jordan Kyrou
Boone Jenner – Justin Sourdif – Ryan Leonard
DEFENSEMEN
Jakub Chychrun / Timothy Liljegren
Martin Fehervary / Vincent Desharnais
Cole Hutson / Dylan McIlrath
Goalies: Logan Thompson and Charlie Lindgren
Potential scratches: Matt Roy (injured), Ivan Miroshnichenko and Ethen Frank
Injured Reserve: Rasmus Sandin
- The Washington blueline is banged up already. Sandin remains out from an injury he suffered last April against the Penguins. Matt Roy, recently named one of the team’s alternate captains, looks like he will be out tonight as well.
- The Caps have switched some lines up lately, rising star Ryan Leonard is down on the fourth line but still expected to play plenty of minutes as he gets handed some more defensive responsibilities.
- It’ll be interesting to reconcile the reputational glow-up lately on Deshairnais. As recently as his time with the Penguins in 2025 he was seen as something of a liability and limited with his mobility and puck skills. A successful turn in, San Jose of all places, to turn his perception around as an effective defensive player. Not too many players go from traded for a fifth round pick four drafts from now to a $16.8 million contract in just over one calendar year.
Season stats
via hockeydb
- Tuch hit the ground running with two goals in his first game as a Capital. The goalie Thompson started off on the right foot this season as well and likely will be playing .
- It’s only two games yet it’s a pretty startling stat-sheet for Ovechkin. He has the one assist, and shockingly just one total shot on goal while averaging just over 13 minutes of ice time per game. That ice time total is a little misleading due to situations and circumstance (the Caps have been shorthanded for an abnormally high 17:20 over their first two games), but it’s shocking just the same even early to see those numbers on Ovechkin in the smallest of samples.
- A big issue for the Caps last season was only having Dubois available for 29 games due to injury after he scored 66 points the season prior in 2024-25. He’s back now and the graduation from the AHL of the younger Protas brother Ilya has revamped the center depth for this season in Washington.
- Size is the name of the game for the Caps these days. Eight skaters are 6’4” or taller, and that doesn’t include solid/physical players like Ovechkin, Roy, Jenner and Fehervary that no one would confuse for being small. Only Frank, Beauvillier (and the generously listed at 6’0 Hutson) are under 6’1 on the team.
And now for the Pens
Projected lines
via yesterday’s practice
FORWARDS
Hendrix Lapierre – Sidney Crosby – Rickard Rakell
Egor Chinakhov – Tommy Novak – Evgeni Malkin
Ville Koivunen – Ben Kindel – Bryan Rust or Andrei Kuzmenko
Connor Dewar – Blake Lizotte – Nick Robertson
DEFENSEMEN
Declan Carlile / Erik Karlsson
Sam Girard / Kaeden Korczak
Trevor van Riemsdyk / Kris Letang
Goalies: Arturs Silovs and Sergei Murashov
Potential Scratches: Filip Hallander, Elmer Soderblom, Ilya Solovyov
IR: Ryan Graves, Justin Brazeau, Bryan Rust
- The Penguins make their first major switches of the season, changing Robertson and Lapierre from the first to fourth lines, and perhaps will see the season debut of Rust, pending some conversations.
- There was no early word on the starting goalie, just editorializing based on how things have gone so far, would you expect Silovs to play tonight and then think about getting Murashov back out there on Friday against Columbus? That would make some level of sense
Goals from everywhere
