The New York Islanders and the Washington Capitals meet in NHL action from the Capital One Arena on Tuesday night.
The New York Islanders will try to rebound from a 2-0 loss to the Devils in their last matchup. Mathew Barzal leads the Islanders in scoring with 4 points coming on 2 goals and 2 assists while Anders Lee, Jordan Eberle, Noah Dobson and Nick Leddy each have 3 points with Lee and Eberle each logging 2 goals and an assist while Dobson and Leddy each have 3 assists. Semyon Varlamov owns a 3-0 record with 2 shutouts and a single goal against for a 0.33 GAA while Ilya Sorokin hasn’t been so lucky, going 0-2 with a 3.57 GAA so far this season.
The Washington Capitals will try to bounce back from a 4-3 loss to the Sabres last time out. Nicklas Backstrom leads the Capitals in scoring with 7 points coming on 4 goals with 3 assists while Jakub Vrana, T.J. Oshie and Tom Wilson each have 6 points with Vrana and Wilson scoring 3 goals and 3 assists while Oshies has two goals and four helpers. Alex Ovechkin and Tom Wilson each have a goal and four assists for their troubles this season, logging 5 points. Vanek Vanacek’s emerged as the #1 goalie for Washington for the time being, posting a 2-1 record with a 2.87 GAA this season.
New York is 2-5 in their last 7 Tuesday games while the under is 7-0-1 in their last 8 games overall. Washington is 1-4 in their last 5 games overall and 1-4 in their last 5 games as an underdog while the over is 18-6-2 in their last 26 Tuesday games. The over is 5-2-1 in the last 8 meetings between these two teams.
I’m going to side with the under here. We all know what we’re getting with the Islanders, good, fundamental hockey that’s hard-hitting while also disciplined as a testament to Barry Trotz as head coach. Washington on the other hand is still missing 4 key players, including Alex Ovechkin, and I just think that’s a lot of talent to be missing to help contribute to a game going over so I’ll have to take the under in this spot.