New York Rangers are in DC to face the Washington Capitals

After sitting on a bitter loss in the Canadian Capital earlier in the week, the New York Rangers will be looking to amend their defeat at the hands of the Ottawa Senators when playing against the team from the American capital. It'll be Alexander Ovechkin and the Washington Capitals providing the opposition for the Blueshirts in this one. Capital One Arena is not an easy place to grab two points, and the Capitals have been better than their expectations this season. This has all the makings of a difficult game for New York.

The most important part of the game plan for Peter Laviolette and his coaching staff has to be keeping the Great Eight off the score sheet. Alexander Ovechkin has been one of the best goal scorers in the history of the NHL during the course of his career, but he is one of the few dangerous weapnos on this Caps team. Quiet him and this team starts to loose its dangerous edge that it seems to have on paper..

For the nlueshirts, still no Filip Chytil or Kaapo Kakko, who were both put on LTIR a few days ago. Jonny Brodzinski will be looking to continue his hot start to life in the NHL as he replaces Kakko in the lineup but the Rangers ultimately will need more from its star players. Mika Zibanejad has been on a hot streak recently ,and he will be looking to get back into ut against the Capitals.

Projected Lineups

New York Rangers

Chris Kreider - Mika Zibanejad - Jonny Brodzinski
Artemi Panarin - Voncent Trocheck - Alexis Lafreniere
Will Cuylle - Nick Bonino - Blake Wheeler
Jimmy Vesey - Barclay Goodrow - Tyler Pitlick
K'Andre Miller - Jacob Trouba
Ryan Lindgren - Adam Fox
Erik Gustafsson - Braden Schneider
Igor Shesterkin
Jonathan Quick

Washington Capitals

Alex Ovechkin - Dylan Strome - Tom Wilson
Sonny Milano - Evgeny Kuznetsov - T.J. Oshie
Aliaksei Protas - Connor McMichael - Anthony Mantha
Beck Malenstyn - Nic Dowd - Nicolas Aube-Kubel
Martin Fehervary - John Carlson
Joel Edmundson - Nick Jensen
Rasums Sandin - Trevor van Riemsdyk
Charlie Lindgren
Darcy Kuemper

Puck Drop

This is a 7 p.m. Eastern puck drop from CapitalOne Arena in Washington DC. New York will be looking to try and fight off their overwhelming defeat in Ottawa with victory over the Capitals in a hostile building in DC. This is going to be a very difficult game against a team that is eyeing the chance to widen the gap between itself and the second wild card spots in the East as the season goes along.