Tonight at 7:00 p.m. ET, the Ottawa Senators (21-19-9, 51 points) and Washington Capitals (22-19-9, 53 points) hit the ice at the Verizon Center in Washington, D.C. for the third and final meeting against each other this season. The game can be live streamed here. Ottawa fans can hear all of the action on TSN 1200 while Washington fans can do the same on WFED 1500.
The Senators look for the season sweep but lost both games of their two-game homestand while Washington enters play looking for its first win this season against Ottawa while coming off of a road trip where it went 0-3-0. The Senators defeated the Capitals 6-4 in Washington on Nov. 27 and 3-1 in Ottawa on Dec. 30.
The Capitals pulled starting goaltender Philipp Grubauer in both losses at home but he may get a chance to redeem himself tonight.
"It's not the way I wanted it to go, but it's part of the job. A player gets benched, a goalie gets pulled," Grubauer said after getting pulled in New York, according to NHL.com. "It's my job to stop the puck, I didn't stop it today. I've got to work on that and move on."
Grubauer is 6-4-5 with a 2.38 goals-against average and a 9.26 save percentage thus far this season. The Senators are likely to go with Craig Anderson, who is 15-10-6 with a 3.19 GAA and a .902 save percentage.
The Senators will look to put their struggles behind them and focus on the big picture.
"Since the first of December we've been a pretty consistent team game in and game out," coach Paul MacLean said after practice Sunday. "You have to look at the big picture and say 'We're looking to be in a good spot after 82 games, not 49 games.' We need to have a maintenance day to get everybody back up and running and get ready for our next game."
Ottawa has been led by Erik Karlsson (11-35-46), Bobby Ryan (19-19-38) and Kyle Turris (14-23-37) thus far this season. Karlsson has five points in his three games.
The Capitals may be without leading scorer Alex Ovechkin (35-14-49) due to an injury. Without Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom (11-38-49) and Mikhail Grabovski (12-21-33) pace the team in points.
Ottawa looks to end a two-game skid while Washington will try to avoid a season sweep when these two teams go head-to-head tonight at the Verizon Center in Washington.
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