Tonight at 7:30 p.m. ET, the Washington Capitals (20-16-6, 46 points) and Tampa Bay Lightning (26-13-4, 56 points) skate against each other at the Tampa Bay Times Forum for the second of three meetings against each other this season. The game can be live streamed here. Washington fans can hear all of the action by adjusting their radios to WFED 1500 while Tampa Bay fans can do the same on WFLA 970.
Washington enters a stretch of six games in nine days and is trying to overcome a four-game losing streak after it has lost six of seven while Tampa Bay comes in having just put their red-hot goaltender on the injured reserve. The first time these two teams met, the Capitals topped the Lightning 6-5 in a shootout on Dec. 10.
The Lightning placed Ben Bishop on the injured reserve with an upper-body injury sustained in warm-ups that he aggravated on a stick play during the team's last game.
"It wasn't that bad [after warm-ups]," Bishop told the Tampa Bay Tribune. "It was a shot and I don't know if it was from before that or what, but it was nothing. I got off after warm-ups and I was fine, and on that play it just really spiked it."
With Bishop gone, Anders Lindback will get the start and is 4-8-1 with a 3.11 goals-against average and a .882 save percentage while Philipp Grubauer will start for the fifth time in six games for the Capitals and is 5-2-3 with a 2.20 GAA and a .932 save percentage.
The Capitals are currently carrying three goaltenders but haven't been able to shake a four-game losing streak.
"It's not optimal," coach Adam Oates said per NHL.com. "It's not. If there is one guy playing good, the other two guys want their chance. They're fighting for scraps in a sense. So, it's not optimal, but it's the way it is right now."
Nicklas Backstrom has paced Washington with 46 points off of 10 goals and 36 assists while Alex Ovechkin has an NHL-leading 31 markers along with 12 helpers for 43 points and Mikhail Grabovski has found the twine 11 times and added 19 assists for 30 points.
Tampa Bay has been led by Martin St. Louis who has 40 points off of 19 goals and 21 assists while Valtteri Filppula has 14 points in his past 11 games for a total of 34 while lighting the lamp 17 times and adding 17 assists and Teddy Purcell is on a five-game point streak for a total of 26 off of eight tallies and 18 helpers.
The Capitals look to overcome a four-game skid while the Lightning hopes to carry on without its No.1 goaltender when the lights come up at the Tampa Bay Times Forum tonight in Florida.
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