WASHINGTON — Jesperi Kotkaniemi is still waiting for the green light from the medical staff and that means he will miss a seventh consecutive game when the Canadiens face the Capitals Friday (7 p.m., TSN2, RDS, TSN 690 Radio).
Head coach Claude Julien said Jordan Weal will rejoin the lineup after four games as a healthy scratch. He will play right wing on the fourth line, while Nick Cousins moves back to the left side.
The Capitals have the best record in the NHL (14-2-4) and Julien suggested they don’t have many weaknesses.
“There are always changes, but they have a lot of the same players,” said Julien. “Their core group is there and they’re still the same dangerous team they’ve always been. They have a lot of skill, they’re big, they have speed, they have a lot of everything. They’re where they are in the standings for the right reasons.”
Carey Price will start for the 16th time in 19 games and Julien has suggested he might come back with Price on Saturday when the Canadiens are home to the New Jersey Devils.
“We’d love to have him every game, but it’s not realistic,” said Julien. “You carry two goalies for that reason. We all know he’s going to get the majority of the games if he’s healthy and playing well. We manage the best way we can. Part of it is looking at the schedule and part of it is staying on top of it with him. We give him some time off from practice because that’s not as important for him as games.”
Julien will use Shea Weber and Ben Chiarot as his No. 1 defence pair and will try to match them as much as possible against Alex Ovechkin’s line.
“We’re trying to manage it the best way we can to give everybody a chance to succeed,” said Julien. “That means playing some young guys to give them some experience so that we get better down the road. It’s always harder when you’re on the road to protect those guys because you don’t have the last change. You do what you can.”
Brendan Gallagher said this game represents the biggest challenge the Canadiens have faced in the young season.
One key is to stop Ovechkin, who has 31 goals and 22 assists in 48 games against Montreal.
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“It’s not the easiest thing to do,” said Gallagher. “You try to limit the time and space of his playmakers. Whether he’s playing with (Nicklas) Backstrom or (Evgeny) Kuznetsov, they do a great job of finding him and they know where his spot is on the ice. It’s tough because it doesn’t take much time for him to get his shot off. Obviously, it helps if you can play with the puck but you know you’re going to give him something and I think it’s a question of limiting his chances. And then we have (Carey Price) in net and you hope when (Ovechkin) gets those one or two chances, Pricey makes the save.”
But Gallagher noted Ovechkin isn’t a one-man team and the Canadiens have to be aware of players like defenceman John Carlson, who leads the Capitals with 30 points in 20 games.
“(Carlson is) definitely part of their attack,” said Gallagher. “He does more than his fair share of chipping in. They have a lot of talented players on the other side. If you look up and down the lineup, they have talented guys that can hurt you. You’re not always going to get the matchups you want and, as a team, we have to be ready to compete and do our job. We have to have faith in our structure and believe that whoever’s on the ice can do the job. If you’re not ready to play, you’re going to be embarrassed.”
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