Caps vs Flyers Pregame: It Begins

By Peter Hassett

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April 14, 2016 4:08 pm

Photo: Chris Gordon

Pitter-patter, let’s get at ‘er. The regular season is over and now the real dance begins.

At 7 PM tonight, the Capitals and the Flyers will face off at Verizon Center (or on CSN-DC).

You’ve been waiting for this since last May, and now it’s here. Crash the net.

Team	Record	Possession	PDO	Power Play	Penalty Kill
Washington Capitals	56-18-8	52.0%	101.1	21.9% (5th)	85.2% (2nd)
Philadelphia Flyers	41-27-14	50.1%	100.5	18.9% (11th)	80.5% (20th)

Projected Lineup

Judging by this week’s practice and assuming everyone’s healthy, here are the lines from Katie Brown. Get pumped.

Ovechkin – Backstrom – Oshie
Burakovsky – Kuznetsov – Williams
Chimera – Richards – Johansson
Winnik – Beagle – Wilson

Orpik – Carlson
Alzner – Niskanen
Schmidt – Orlov

Holtby

Pictorially,

Sizing Up the Flyers

Pat and Spenser laid it out for us.

At 5v5, the Flyers finished hot while the Caps had a late-season swoon.
Special teams might be where the Caps can wrest control of this series. (The analysis in here is amazing btw.)
Goaltending might seem like a big Caps advantage, but it’s really not.

At least the Caps have all the Skintangibles.

Storylines

Barry Trotz is keeping TJ Oshie‘s status on DL. Down low. Not disabled list.
Braden Holtby is dialed in.
Nate Schmidt speaks of the land of Prince and Bob Dylan and the Replacements.
Tom Wilson wants the Flyers to hate him. So there’s one victory already and the game hasn’t even started yet.
The very bright Rob Vollman urges us not to sleep on the Flyers.
Draxx them sklounst.
Predictions. Ian: Caps in 7. Peter: Caps in 5. Keith, a Coin: What the hell, Keith?!
You guys gave us your favorite pump-up songs and your pump-up videos.
If you’re not in the viewing area, you will be hearing a lot of Philly’s calls.
There will probably be a moment of silence tonight. We’ll be good. Promise.

Caps fans, spread the word: If anyone in our house acts the way Penguins Fans did during a moment of silence, I will drop the gloves.

— Wes Johnson (@WesJohnsonVoice) April 14, 2016

There’s a lot more, but just check out Japers’ links. I’m already exhausted.
And, if you’re at VC, be prepared for mups mups mups

@JGreenberg81 If the Caps light 'em up- I think we should too! That's for you to play.

— Bruce Anderson (@Bruce_CapsOrgan) April 14, 2016

The Bandwagon

All aboooooooooard!

Finally

This has been the best regular season in Caps’ franchise history. Just two years after the team’s nadir, they’re back to being great and poised to make noise in the second season.

2015-16: It’s been real. It’s been fun. It’s been real fun.

Whatever happens next, this is my aesthetic: