Pregame Notes: Washington Capitals vs. Florida Panthers

 The Caps are back indoors today as they take on the Florida Panthers. The Caps and Panthers have split a pair of shootouts. The Panthers are a very physical and hard working team that along with the Caps are on the playoff bubble as we approach the half way point of the 2014-2015 season. With today being a 3 p.m start time their is no morning skate but here are what the lines were in practice yesterday.


Forwards:

Ovechkin-Backstrom-Burakovsky
Johansson-Kuznetsov-Brouwer
Laich-Fehr-Ward
Chimera-Beagle-Wilson

Defense and Goalies:

Orpik-Carlson
Alzner-Niskanen
Hillen-Green

Holtby 
Peters


Other Notes:

*The Caps will look to see if they can continue to roll today. This can be a trap game with a solid Panther squad coming into the Verizon Center. However, with the way the teams in the Metro are playing right now the Caps have to keep pace.

*It looks like Andre Burakovsky will find his way back into the lineup today. Not only that he will start on the top line with Backstrom and Ovechkin.

*It appears sometime soon Justin Peters might make a appearance. However, I believe it is more likely that it happens in the back to back games in Toronto and Philadelphia this week. I will post if there are any changes in the lineup but this is probably what we will see today.

*The Caps had a great month of December and started January on a good note as well. The thing to watch is will the Winter Classic win be a turning point for this Caps team? They have been playing great hockey lately and are coming together as a group.

*I expect Roberto Luongo to start for the Panthers because he is one of the big reasons the Panthers are 17-10-9 on the season.

*This is a big game because the Panthers are only 2 points behind the Caps for the top Wild Card spot. The Caps again sit a point behind the Rangers for 3rd in the Metro after they beat the Sabres last night.

*The Hershey Bears beat the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins 2-1 in a shootout. Pheonix Copley was in net for the Bears who are now 17-12-4 and 7th in the Eastern Conference.

*Gametime 3 p.m on CSN