On Tuesday, the Capitals will play their first-round playoff opponent from last spring, the Toronto Maple Leafs. The Caps will be going into that potentially offensive explosive game with multiple question marks on the back end.

After Saturday night’s absolute trouncing at the hands of the Philadelphia Flyers, Caps bench boss Barry Trotz tried to solve some of those questions with more mixing and matching of his defensive pairings.

In a tweet from the Washington Post’s Isabelle Khurshudyan, we got our first look at the potential duos set for action Tuesday night.

Defense: Orpik-Bowey; Djoos-Carlson; Orlov-Chorney

— Isabelle Khurshudyan (@ikhurshudyan) October 16, 2017

We can probably assume that the Caps consider the pairing of Christian Djoos and John Carlson to be their number one outfit as Carlson got close to 23 minutes of purely five-on-five action against the Flyers, the team’s first game after Matt Niskanen‘s upper-body injury.

The split of the three veterans, Calrson, Dmitry Orlov, and Brooks Orpik was also to be expected. The Capitals only played 1:39 of their last game without one of those three on the ice.

Khurshudyan also spoke with Caps general manager Brian MacLellan before Saturday night’s game in Philly. MacLellan revealed the possibility of a trade to shore things up on the back line.

“I think we’re considering it,” MacLellan said.

With a team giving up shots at the rate it has been, that is not surprising.

We figured #Caps goalies would be busy this yr. Club has allowed at least 36 shots against in 4 of 6 games this year. Did so 7x all last yr

— Ben Raby (@BenRaby31) October 16, 2017

However, GMBM did also say that the team would like to explore all their internal options before deciding to go down that road.

“Our job is to identify the guys we think are going to play, then slowly integrate them into our lineup,” MacLellan said. “Our goal is by the end of the year to have a better picture on our D, not right now.”

MacLellan specifically mentioned Jonas Siegenthaler as someone he’d like to see get a “few games.” Siegenthaler, who lost 24 pounds during the offseason by cutting down on Thai food and potato chips, performed well at the end of training camp, according to Mac.

The team also has several other candidates in Hershey including 2016 first-round pick Lucas Johansen, Tyler Lewington, Colby Williams, and Connor Hobbs.

What do you think about the new pairs and the possibility of a trade?