The Capitals made some tweaks to the lineup in California following a disappointing loss to Edmonton to close out a four-game homestand.
After taking a day to travel to California and digest Friday's ugly loss, the Washington Capitals got back to work on Saturday and made quite a few tweaks to boot.
Head coach Spencer Carbery shook up the lines with the team's forwards being unable to connect in a disastrous 5-0 loss to Edmonton. And with T.J. Oshie not travelling due to the upper-body injury he suffered in the defeat, the young forward scratches waiting for their chance to slot in got back in the mix.
Both Matthew Phillips and Hendrix Lapierre are now in the lineup, as Phillips filled in for Oshie as the second-line right wing while Connor McMichael shifted to the left wing to open a center role up for Lapierre at 3C.
With those two young scratches getting their chance, Anthony Mantha, who recently returned from a ruptured eardrum and said he was starting to find his game again, was rotating in on the fourth line with Nicolas Aube-Kubel.
In addition to making those chances, Carbery reunited Evgeny Kuznetsov and Alex Ovechkin on the top line with Tom Wilson.
On the blue line, Martin Fehervary, who is expected to play on Monday against the San Jose Sharks after missing the last five games with a lower-body injury, was back on the top pairing with John Carlson. It will be the first time this season that the team has its entire expected blue line healthy and available.
Here were the full combinations, per The Washington Post's Bailey Johnson:
Alex Ovechkin-Evgeny Kuznetsov-Tom Wilson
Connor McMichael-Dylan Strome-Matthew Phillips
Sonny Milano-Hendrix Lapierre-Aliaksei Protas
Beck Malenstyn-Nic Dowd-Nicolas Aube-Kubel/Anthony Mantha
Martin Fehervary-John Carlson
Rasmus Sandin-Nick Jensen
Joel Edmundson-Trevor van Riemsdyk
Alex Alexeyev-Lucas Johansen
Darcy Kuemper
Charlie Lindgren
The Capitals return to game action on Monday in San Jose.