Goalies: The Headline for Another Classic Penguins vs. Capitals Showdown

It's nice for the Penguins to buckle down and play a solid hockey game for once. The caveat is that it was against Buffalo - the worst team in the Eastern Conference.

Oh, would you look at that. The Penguins play again tonight...against the undisputed best team in the Eastern Conference. Here we go again.

Lowdown on the Capitals

Plain and simple. The Capitals are a wagon.

They don't lose at home. They don't lose on the road. They score a ton of goals. They don't give up any goals. Washington is the definition of a juggernaut.

Logan Thompson will win the Vezina

Logan Thompson, former Stanley Cup champion with the Vegas Golden Knights, has been completely and utterly ridiculous this season.

His record is 20-2-3. Read that again.

Now read it one more time.

Did you comprehend that? Maybe you should read it one more time.

Good? Okay.

Thompson is boasting a .924 save percentage and a GAA of 2.13 this season, and he will be in net against the Penguins tonight.

So how can the Penguins turn one win into two against all odds tonight?

Keep the power play buzzing

The Penguins netted three goals on the power play last night against the Sabres. The usual suspects in Rickard Rakell and Bryan Rust did their part, and Cody Glass even got involved as well.

It's not a bad mark, but Thompson's save percentage goes way down when the Capitals are down a man (.867). Almost 21% of the goals Thompson has given up this season have come on power plays. That's a staggering number.

This means that the power play has to cash in tonight if they want a shot.

Play ugly

The other way to beat large, stalwart goalies is to get ugly goals. Think of guys like Michael Bunting sticking around in the crease to pick up a rebound and poke it by Thompson.

Tips are also the way to go against goalies like this. Getting sticks on shots for redirects make it to where a sound goalie has no chance against certain shots.

Erik Karlsson love the shot pass where he fakes hitting a bomb and instead finds a backdoor option like Sidney Crosby for a tap-in.

The Penguins will have to get creative in this one. It's not going to come easy.

Help out the rookie

Alex Nedeljkovic had one of the greatest games by a goaltender last night (more on that in an article to be released later), but in a back to back, the net will go to Joel Blomqvist, who is making his first NHL start since November 11th.

While Blomqvist was excellent against shot volume in his first stint with the NHL club, the expectation can't be for him to stop 40 shots like Ned did last night.

If you're a skater tonight wearing white and gold, the mindset has to be to play a sound defensive game and give as much help to the rookie netminder as possible. Let him get comfortable in his first game back.

And by all means, keep tabs on #8. Alex Ovechkin is leading the Capitals in goals (21) at the spry, young age of 39. He can smell Gretzky's record, and there's reason to believe he wants to hit it in 2025 so he can retire in the offseason.

Blomqvist beat the Capitals shortly before he was sent back to the AHL earlier this season. He stopped 32 of 34 shots en route to a 4-2 Penguins win. Charlie Lindgren was in net for Washington that night, so Blomqvist will get an opportunity to beat the Capitals again with the likely Vezina winner between the pipes.

Puck drop is scheduled for 7pm EST from Washington D.C.