Tonight, the Caps return home to the Verizon Center for the first time since February 7. Their opponent is one of the NHL’s better teams, the Los Angeles Kings, who also lead the Pacific Division. The Kings are known for their elite possession numbers and their objectively terrible Dustin Brown contract.

The Kings may not possess the same speed or offense as the Stars, but the Caps must be better than they were Saturday night. It should go without saying that another late rally isn’t acceptable.

Mike Richards and Justin Williams get to say hello to some old friends. Hopefully they say hello by scoring a goal. Speaking of saying hello, Brooks Orpik returns to the lineup tonight.

Puck drops at 7 PM. Glue your eyeballs to CSN-DC if you dare.

Projected Lineup

Per Katie Brown:

Ovechkin – Backstrom – Oshie
Burakovsky – Kuznetsov – Williams
Chimera – Johansson – Wilson
Laich – Richards – Latta

Schmidt – Carlson
Alzner – Niskanen
Orpik – Orlov

Grubauer

Happy Snow Day!

Throwback (Tuesday?) to Tian Tian the panda being hella cute in the snow. Hopefully you enjoyed or are enjoying your day(s) off this week.

Storylines

• Brooks Orpik is back!
• You may have heard that Mike Richards is facing his former team.
• So is Justin Williams, who (jokingly) said he’d fight Drew Doughty.
• Alex Ovechkin has reincarnated as his younger self.
• The Caps have a PP specialist named Nick Backtrom Evgeny Kuznetsov Jason Chimera.
• There’s more to Brooks Laich than goals and assists.
• With Orpik back and Beagle soon to return, who could the Caps trade for? They don’t have much in the way of cap space…
• Marian Gaborik is out.

Today in 1982

The Jam were all the rage in the UK. “A Town Called Malice” hit #1 on the UK charts, but it’s still timeless (to me, anyway.) Are they, or are they not, the most overrated band of all time?

Full RMNB Coverage of Caps at Kings