ARLINGTON, V.A. — After a rough go of it in Game 1 against the Carolina Hurricanes, the Washington Capitals got back to the basics with film breakdown and off-ice work, in addition to an optional practice.
Tom Wilson, Aliaksei Protas, Ryan Leonard, Taylor Raddysh, Ethen Frank, Dylan McIlrath, Ethan Bear, Charlie Lindgren and Mitchell Gibson were all on the ice for the skate, which included drills, skills work and attention to detail and skating.
Washington was heavily outplayed in the second round opener, being outshot 33-14 in an eventual 2-1 overtime loss. However, the group is hungry to get back to its identity in Game 2.
"It's not as much what (Carolina) did, but what we didn't do yesterday," Brandon Duhaime said of the loss. "We kind of got to look in the mirrors at ourselves and just improve."
When it comes to the defeat, Washington has already put it out of its mind, not dwelling on the defeat and instead focusing on how to even things up before heading to Raleigh.
"That game's over now. We've moved on. Like we can learn from it, no question, but you can't sulk on it. We have six games here that are a potential to play," Nic Dowd said. "I mean, you watch the Winnipeg series, that game went down to the last one second. Anything can happen in these playoffs... today we're focused on individuals and how they can get their game ready for tomorrow. That game's over with. Even if we had won, that game's over with. Now we have another potential six games, and we'll start with tomorrow."
Going into Thursday's Game 2, coach Spencer Carbery suggested that there could be lineup changes coming as he assesses individual performances.
"We do that every game, win or lose. But when you go through something like that, it makes you look at different options and what, as a staff, if we need to do anything, if at all, to try to problem-solve some of the issues that we had last night," Carbery said. "That goes into systematic personnel, line combination, D-pair, all of it we'll talk about, break down, and then figure out what we feel like is the best course of action for any type of alteration."
Game 2 is on Thursday at 7 p.m. at Capital One Arena.