Well fellow Caps fans, just two weeks until the Capitals open their 2015-2016 NHL season. In the next day or two the staff will pare down the roster so it is substantially closer to the final slate of 23 players who will be on the roster for opening night's game. By and large most of those spots are clear, in fact there's at least 15 players in my opinion who are a "lock" for that roster. By "sweater number they are: 2) Matt Niskanen; 8) Alexander Ovechkin; 9) Dmitry Orlov; 14) Justin Williams; 25) Jason Chimera; 27) Karl Alzner; 43) Tom Wilson; 44) Brooks Orpik; 65) Andre Burakovsky; 70) Braden Holtby; 74) John Carlson; 77) T. J. Oshie; 88) Nate Schnmidt; 90) Marcus Johansson; and 92) Evgeny Kuznetsov. Add 19) Nicklas Backstrom if he's healthy enough and you have 16 spots spoken for/allocated but I suspect he will not be . That leaves 7 spots to be assigned that are currently being "fought for," It remains unclear wether either Justin Peters or Philipp Grubaurr will be the backup for Holtby but that takes us down to 6 open spots on the roster. Then one of the remaining guys, I'm guessing Taylor Chorney because of his size will be the seventh D-Man and also assuming that Brooks Orpik will be healthy on opening night and you are down to five (5) open spots on the roster. Now, if you assume that 21) Brooks Laich is currently un-tradeable and we are down to 4 open spots, unless he's traded to free up Cap space, etc.
So here's where we are so far on opening night: Forward Lines:
Line 1: 8 - 92 - 77
Line 2: 65 - ?? - 14
Line 3: 90 - 21/83 - 43
Line 4: 25 - 83/21 - ??
13th Forward: ???
14th Forward: 19 (Scratched on Opening Night)
Defense Pairings:
First Pairing: 74 - 44
Second Pairing: 2 - 27
Third Pairing: 9 - 88
7th Defenseman: 4
Goaltenders: 70 & 31 or 35.
I believe the last roster spots on opening night will be: 1 - 10) Center Derek Roy who I think will be signed to a single year contract by the Capitals later this week. 2 - 49) W Stanislav Galiev and 3 - 46) Center Michael Latta. I project the opening night 2nd line center will be Roy and Galiev and Latta will round out the final two roster slots on opening night and Backstrom will be a scratch or on IR.
What do you think? Are you looking forward to this season as much as I am?
LETS GO CAPS!!!!!!
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