Capitals, Hurricanes kick off series between evenly matched rivals

The wait is finally over for the Washington Capitals and Carolina Hurricanes to get their second-round Stanley Cup playoff series underway.

Game 1 is Tuesday in Washington, and the top two teams from the Metropolitan Division are taking a similar approach to the best-of-seven matchup.

Washington, which posted the Eastern Conference’s best record, last played on Wednesday, wrapping up its first-round series with the Montreal Canadiens in a 4-1 victory in Game 5. The Hurricanes also clinched their series with the New Jersey Devils in five games, with the last being a 5-4 double-overtime victory last Tuesday.

Despite the stakes involved, neither coach said they feel much different about this stage of the postseason than they do the 82-game grind from October to April.

“All year, we ask our guys to play their hardest,” Carolina coach Rod Brind’Amour said Monday. “Well, you can’t ask for more now … Like it’s not about pressure. It’s a good time of year to be playing.”

Capitals coach Spencer Carbery told reporters he felt “worse” watching the recent Game 7s than coaching in the heat of the moment.

“This time of year, your whole season and everything that you work for is on the line, and one penalty call, one missed assignment, one shot at the net can decide eight months of hard work,” Carbery said.

Carolina will provide a test for the Capitals. The Hurricanes had 11 players score at least one goal against the Devils. Sebastian Aho, who led the Hurricanes in scoring in the regular season with 74 points (29 goals, 45 assists), had eight points (three goals, five assists) in the first round. In 31 career games against the Capitals, Aho has 14 goals and 30 points.

Dylan Strome led the Capitals with seven assists and nine points in the first round, and 39-year-old Alex Ovechkin, who tallied 44 goals in 65 games, had four goals and an assist in five games versus the Habs.

Ovechkin, the NHL’s all-time leading goal scorer, has a history of lighting the lamp against Carolina with 52 goals and 107 points in 93 games. That’s the most points he has scored against any team.

Washington and Carolina split their four regular-season games, with both teams winning their games on home ice. The Capitals, though, needed a shootout to take the last contest 5-4 on April 10.

Logan Thompson, Washington’s top goalie, played just one period of those games. He left after the first period of the April 2 game, which the host Hurricanes won 5-1, due to an upper-body injury that kept him out for the remainder of the regular season. He gave up three goals in that loss.

Thompson also lost to Carolina as the Vegas Golden Knights’ netminder after giving up six goals in 45 minutes in a 6-3 loss on Dec. 19, 2023.

Carbery, though, has no qualms about going with Thompson, who went 31-6-6 and posted a personal best 2.49 goals-against average after the Capitals acquired him from Vegas last summer.

“He’s just an ultra, ultra-competitive guy that when the puck drops and the game starts, he wants to win so desperately, and will do anything to keep that black rubber thing out of our net,” the coach said.

Carolina is expected to have Frederik Andersen back in the crease on Tuesday. He left Game 4 of the Devils series after colliding with New Jersey’s Timo Meier and did not play in Game 5.

The 35-year-old Dane is 10-4-3 with a 2.58 GAA in 17 regular-season games against Washington. In his only postseason experience against the Capitals, he went 2-4 for the Toronto Maple Leafs in a 2017 first-round loss.

–Field Level Media