Washington Capitals: Alex Ovechkin returns to practice

There was a slight scare for Washington Capitals fans on Saturday night when Alex Ovechkin went down the tunnel but returned to the bench a minute later. On Tuesday in their first practice since, Alex Ovechkin wasn’t on the ice. Neither was T.J. Oshie for personal reasons.

The Caps made two roster moves Tuesday morning recalling Hershey Bears forwards Michael Sgarbossa and Garrett Pilon to the taxi squad. Ovechkin was listed day to day with a lower body injury. Ovechkin looked like he hurt his leg Saturday night against the New York Rangers when he went down to the training room with trainer Jason Serbus.

We don’t know what caused that but one evidence of Ovechkin being banged up would be his collision with Evgeny Kuznetsov. The night before, also against the Rangers, Ovechkin took a hit from defensemen Ryan Lindgren. Brian MacLellan even admitted in his benchmark talk with the media that Ovechkin has played through “some injuries” behind the scenes that we don’t even know about it.

Plus Ovechkin isn’t getting any younger. Back when he missed a practice in February, he told reporters “I’m 55, you know? We have lots of games. My body needs rest.”

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On Wednesday there was some much better news. Both Ovechkin and Oshie returned to the ice for practice at MedStar Capitals Iceplex. The Caps next game is Thursday night against the New Jersey Devils, so the team has had a nice four day break between game action.

Ovechkin and Oshie went back to the top line, centered by Evgeny Kuznetsov. Here are the rest of the lines per Tom Gulitti of NHL.com:

Ovechkin-Kuznetsov-Oshie
Vrana-Backstrom-Wilson
Sheary-Sgarbossa-Panik/Sprong
Hagelin-Dowd-Hathaway

Dillon-Carlson
Orlov-Schultz
Chara-Jensen
Siegenthaler-TvR

Samsonov
Vanecek
Anderson

Caps head coach Peter Laviolette wouldn’t commit on whether or not Ovechkin will play Thursday against the Devils but he’s “hoping” that he will. He told reporters: 

"“I haven’t seen the trainer since practice ended here. The fact that he was out there, that’s always a positive. So I can’t say definitely one way or the other, but it was great to have him out there today.”"

There was only one player marked absent from Wednesday’s practice, that player being center Lars Eller who’s been out for quite sometime with a lower body injury. Mike Sgarbossa was skating in his place centering the third line. Eller has missed the last four games.

The Caps also re-assigned forwards Brian Pinho and Philippe Maillet from the taxi squad to the Hershey Bears. Hopefully at morning skate tomorrow, we’ll get a better idea on if Ovechkin is in or not.