Washington Capitals: John Carlson will be player to watch against Devils

The Washington Capitals will take on the New Jersey Devils tonight and John Carlson will be the top player to watch. The New Jersey native is currently on a two game point streak with two goals and an assist after scoring twice in last night’s loss to the New York Islanders.

Carlson’s first goal came on a nice blast 61 seconds into the opening period. It was the early spark the Caps needed after Ilya Samsonov and T.J. Oshie collided with the former exiting the ice for a while before coming back in.

Carlson’s second goal came in the third period, finishing a tic tac toe passing sequence from Daniel Sprong to Jakub Vrana. He now has nine goals on the season.

For Carlson, it was his first multi goal game of the season and the seventh multi goal game of his career and first since Dec. 4, 2019 against the Los Angeles Kings. The second goal marked Carlson’s 114th goal of his career, passing Mike Green and Calle Johansson (113 goals) for the third most goals by a defenseman in franchise history.

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Carlson is now 31 goals shy of passing Sergei Gonchar (144 goals) for the second most goals in franchise history by a Capitals defenseman. Carlson is the franchise’s all time leader among defensemen with 509 points, and 395 assists and ranks second in games played (793 games, Johansson: 983 games).

The Caps now have two defensemen that rank in the top 3 in goals among defensemen for a franchise. Zdeno Chara’s 148 goals as a member of the Boston Bruins ranks third in their franchise’s history.

Carlson is tied for third among NHL defensemen in points through games played March 31 with 31 points. Carlson has 32 multi point games dating to the start of 2019-20, 11 more than the next closest defensemen (Tyson Barrie and Victor Hedman) and Carlson ranks 10th among all players.

As Carlson begins to heat up down the stretch, it begs the question, is Carlson good enough for a Norris Trophy as the league’s top defenseman. Last year he led defensemen in goals and points but was robbed as the award went to Roman Josi of the Nashville Predators.

Carlson is a native of New Jersey and grew up a Devils fan. After a two goal game the night before, he returns to his hometown looking for another big game as the Caps hope to end their two game losing streak.

Puck drop is at 7 p.m. and you can catch Carlson and the Caps on NBC Sports Washington.