ARLIINGTON, V.A. — The Washington Capitals have a next man up mentality going into their home opener against the Pittsburgh Penguins, as they deal with injury woes early on with Matt Roy on the shelf.
Roy, who was hurt in Saturday's loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning, remains day-to-day with a lower-body injury and did not practice on Tuesday. Per Spencer Carbery, he'll need "significant improvement" to be able to play in the opener, but the team will continue to monitor his status going into Wednesday.
With Roy likely out, extra defenseman Dylan McIlrath will be the one to slide into the lineup, and was on a pairing with Cole Hutson as Carbery shifted his right-handed defensemen up. Timothy Liljegren is on the top pair with Jakob Chychrun, and Vincent Desharnais is working alongside Martin Fehervary.
That said, those pairings could fluctuate.
"It'll be a lot of game flow, matchup, special teams, so I wouldn't be too worried about who's going to play the most," Carbery explained. "Everyone is going to have to do a little bit more. Matt Roy's a huge part of our D-corps, a huge part of that right side, so it's going to require Lily, Vinny Desharnais to take on a bit bigger piece of the pie... and a great opportunity for Dylan McIlrath."
Not only did the defensive pairs tweak, but the forward lines also got a slight adjustment. Anthony Beauvillier will move into Ryan Leonard's spot alongside Dylan Strome and Alex Ovechkin, and Leonard, in turn, will shift to play with Justin Sourdif and Boone Jenner.
The move allows Leonard, who has one goal through two games, to get some more time playing in defensive situations, which Carbery believes will continue to benefit his development.
"He might even play more 5-on-5 minutes with Sourdy's line. If you're thinking any bit of that as a demotion... absolutely false and not the case at all. I thought he's shown really well in the first two games and I've been really impressed with the player that he looks like this year comparatively to last year," Carbery said. "It's just a matter of putting him on a different line that has a little bit of a different deployment."
The power-play units also remained the same. Here are the full line combinations:
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
Jakob Chychrun-Timothy Liljegren
Martin Fehervary-Vinny Desharnais
Cole Hutson-Dylan McIlrath
Logan Thompson
Charlie Lindgren
Power Play 1: Ovechkin, Chychrun, Wilson, Dubois, Strome
Power Play 2: Leonard, Hutson, I. Protas, Tuch, Kyrou
