Washington Capitals v Florida Panthers Live

While the Caps established themselves in the upper echelon of the Eastern Conference, the Panthers are struggling to stay in the playoff race. Hoping to bounce back from two consecutive losses, the Florida Panthers will host the Washington Capitals on Thursday at 0:30 a.m. GMT.

Leading the Southeast Division with an excellent 26-11-6 record, the Capitals are hoping to keep up their high level of play in the second half of this year’s NHL campaign. Especially their explosive offense around franchise centerpiece Alex Ovechkin was too much to handle for their opponents on most nights. More precisely, Washington is the best offensive team in the Eastern Conference, scoring no less than 154 goals in 43 games thus far. Albeit the Caps did not excel at the defensive end of the ice, they still managed to get their act together when the game was on the line. Offensively, All-Star forward Ovechkin leads the team with 27 goals and 26 assists for a total of 53 points in just 35 appearances.

In contrast, the Panthers are fairly disappointed with their performance in the first three months of play. Being at the bottom of the Conference with a mediocre 17-20-7 record, the franchise from Southern Florida will have to improve considerably to make a push for a playoff spot down the stretch. Most importantly, the team around Nathan Norton will have to tighten its defense as they allowed their opponents to score a whopping 140 goals in 44 games. Therefore, it appears to be rather questionable whether coach Peter DeBoer’s squad will be able to give the Capitals a run for their money. At the end of the day, the Panthers do neither have the offensive scoring nor the depth Washington can count on.

You can watch all games of the Washington Capitals and Florida Panthers right here on www.watchlivenhl.com, the home of NHL live streaming.