Saturday, the Washington Capitals kick off the first half of back-to-back afternoon games with a matchup against their forever rivals the Pittsburgh Penguins.

According to Mike Vogel, former Pens player Conor Sheary did not make the trip up to Pittsburgh and will miss out due to a non-COVID illness. Vogs also reports that goaltender Ilya Samsonov will get his second-straight start after beating the Tampa Bay Lightning in his last appearance.

Sheary did not practice on Friday so his status for this game was always in doubt. Here is how head coach Peter Laviolette had his team lined up at that practice via The Washington Post’s Samantha Pell.

Jumping right into Sheary’s spot was Garnet Hathway who missed out against the Lightning due to his own non-COVID illness. The rest of the lineup is the exact same grouping that took down Tampa at home on Wednesday.

Samsonov was the netminder in that win as he stopped 25 of 28 shots on the way to the victory. Saturday’s game will be Samsonov’s second start in April after he only made three in the entire month of March. He has amassed a 20-9-4 record this season with a 2.95 goals-against average and a .899 save percentage.

Penguins coach Mike Sullivan announced that Sidney Crosby, John Marino, and Radim Zohorna will be game-time decisions as they are all also ill. All three missed Pittsburgh’s last game against the New York Rangers. Tristan Jarry will be the Pens’ goaltender.

Headline photo: Elizabeth Kong/RMNB