The Capitals made a bold lineup decision on Saturday, and here's why they did it.

Washington Capitals head coach Spencer Carbery made a bold lineup decision on Saturday against the St. Louis Blues, as he moved Evgeny Kuznetsov to the fourth-line center spot while placing Nic Dowd alongside Alex Ovechkin and Tom Wilson on the top-6.

And though the experiment didn't pay off as the team would have to shuffle on the fly to try and find some kind of spark, Carbery said the experiment was worth a try. He also he had strong words for the Ovechkin-Kuznetsov combo this season.

"We were just trying to figure out a way what to do with those two lines, because Kuz and O together have not been good all year and have been getting crushed," he said.

In 37 games and 176:57 minutes together this season, Ovechkin and Kuznetsov have combined for a 41.67 Corsi-for percentage, a 32.92 expected goals-for percentage and 39.16 scoring chances-for percentage. Away from each other, their numbers went up.

The Ovechkin-Dowd-Wilson trio combined for a 56.25 Corsi-for percentage and 58.33 expected goals-for percentage through 10:10 minutes at 5-on-5 on Saturday. Without Dowd, Ovechkin and Wilson had a CF% of 46.18 and xGF% of 40.17. Dowd totalled 17:17 minutes of ice time, while Kuznetsov ended up playing 16:09, with 3:44 of those minutes coming on the power play and penalty kill.

After finding some form of consistency with the Pacioretty-Strome-Oshie and Protas-McMichael-Mantha trio, Carbery said the hope was to strike that balance on the top trio as well.

Kuznetsov has been unable to find consistency this season, as he has just 14 points in 30 games. Dowd has 12 points in 35 outings, including points in five of the last eight games.

"We're trying to find something," he added. "It leaves you in a bit of a tough spot to find a way to make it all fit together, so we made that change."