The Washington Capitals aim to extend their winning streak to five games and complete a home-and-home sweep of the Philadelphia Flyers on Wednesday when the clubs meet in the nation’s capital.
The Capitals extended their hot streak with a decisive 4-1 victory in Philadelphia on Tuesday.
Nic Dowd and Andrew Mangiapane each scored a short-handed goal for Washington in the first period, and defensemen John Carlson and Jakob Chychrun each tallied in the third.
“I saw early on both power plays from both sides struggle and give up chances short-handed,” Washington coach Spencer Carbery said. “And we were able to capitalize on two of them. Great finishes by Dowd — that’s not an easy finish, and he pulls that across — and then (Mangiapane) to give us that two-goal cushion.”
Dylan Strome set up Carlson’s tally as both extended their point streaks to five games. Strome has three goals and five assists in that stretch, while Carlson has contributed two and four, respectively.
Strome collected two goals and three assists to help Washington post a 2-0-1 record against Philadelphia last season.
Capitals goaltender Logan Thompson likely will draw the nod in the rematch after Charlie Lindgren made 17 saves on Tuesday. Thompson has won both of his starts this season and boasts a 1-0-1 record in two career outings vs. the Flyers.
Washington is in the midst of playing eight of its first 13 games overall against Metropolitan Division foes.
“There’s pros and cons to it,” Carbery said. “The pros are from a pre-scout standpoint and playing somebody back-to-back and then getting familiar with them, a team that’s in your division that you’re going to be fighting for points with all year, and probably going to be jockeying with. So those are pros.
“The cons in playing an opponent consistently is sometimes it just wears on the guys a little bit. But that’s life and the schedule, to play the home-and-home, back-to-back. We know it’s a difficult opponent. We had a ton of really quality games against them — on both sides of it — that were highly, highly contested on both sides. So we don’t expect anything different.”
Free-falling Philadelphia saw its losing skid extend to five games (0-4-1) with the Tuesday setback.
Defenseman Travis Sanheim scored the lone goal for the Flyers, who have been outscored 23-11 since posting a 3-2 shootout victory against the Vancouver Canucks in the opener on Oct. 11.
“If we just stay and play our game — it’s not a safe game, it’s a very aggressive game — we’ll get our goals,” Philadelphia coach John Tortorella said. “There’s a fine line of playing aggressive, on your toes and checking forward versus cheating and hoping. That’s when (the play goes) the wrong way, back the other way.
“So that’s what we have to watch for here. We’ve got a group of men here that are going to figure this out. We just have to do it together and not lose ourselves through panic or frustration and forget about how we play.”
Ivan Fedotov likely will be in net for the Flyers as he bids to rebound from a pair of tough outings to begin the season. He has yielded five goals in each game as his goals-against average ballooned to 6.09.
