GDP #21: Sens V Caps: Battle Of The Capitals

The Sens (11-6-3) and Caps (13-5-5-) have their first meeting of the year tonight, when the Battle of the Capitals takes place. Ok ok, so it's not much of a battle, more like a skirmish, a skirmish that not many people care about but still. At least back in the day they had a trophy for the duel. With a win tonight, the Sens can take over 1st place in the division, so the 2 points would be great to get.

The Capitals are coming off a 2-1 shootout loss to the lowly Toronto Maple Leafs, so you know they will put out a better effort tonight. The Caps are of course lead by the most exciting player on the planet, Alexander Ovechkin, but they are not a one trick pony. They many other capable players who cant hurt you, like Mike Green (though highly overrated in my opnion) Alexander Semin, Nicklas Backstrom, Brenda Morrison, plus they have two former Sens in Brian Pothier and Brooks Laich. Rookie Semyon Varlamov is expected to get the start tonight in net.

Several changes for the Sens tonight, as Shean Donovan and Alexei Kovalev will miss the game again, though it didn't seem to hurt us on Saturday. Brian Elliott gets the start, with Pascal being injured at the moment, though it doesn't appear to be serious at least. Here are the new lines for tonight's game, a bit surprising if you ask me, especially Chris Neil on the 2nd line after his bonehead final 5 on Saturday.

Michalek-Spezza-Alfredsson
Foligno-Fisher-Neil
Ruutu-Kelly-Cheechoo
Regin-Winchester-Shannon

Prediction: This will be a tough game, as it always is with Ovechkin and the Caps. It doesn't look so good to me with our backup in, no matter how decent he is, plus Dono and Kovie out still doesn't help. However, we have played much better as of late and have won 3 in a row. Can we make it back to back to back to back? I say yes, Sens win a crazy game 5-4, Spezza scores and Fisher continues his torrid pace with 3 points.

Thoughts?