Capitals vs. Red Wings Lines Tonight: Expected Starters & Goalies

The Washington Capitals and Detroit Red Wings are moments away from facing off in a crucial matchup on ESPN. Players are on the ice for warmups and per Bailey Johnson of The Washington Post on X, T.J. Oshie is back in the lineup. He's been out all of April with an upper body injury and boy do the Caps need him.

Connor McMichael will center that top line which will feature Oshie and Alex Ovechkin. We've got Dylan Strome centering the second line and he talked about the importance of this one. We don't need him to tell us because we know it, the standings know it, you know it, and the numbers know it.

Per Monkey Puck is the following:

Caps playoff chances AS OF THIS WRITING 24.2 percent

Caps playoff chances with regulation win 43 percent

Caps playoff chances with overtime win 36 percent

Caps playoff chances with reglation loss 14.5 percent

Caps playoff chances with overtime loss 18.9 percent

Yeah so the margin for error is small. No excuses. No moral vicories whatsover. It's win and your playoff chances improve. Lose and you're golfing with either the Flyers or the Penguins depending on what happens around the league. It's very tight and the wild card spot has changed hands the last five days, per ESPN on Instagram.

Strome centers a line with Aliaksei Protas, who scored the other night, and Tom Wilson in his fourth game back from his suspension. Over on the third line is Max Pacioretty, who also broke out of a scoring slump with agoal in Sunday's overtime loss.

Down on the fourth line is Nic Dowd, Beck Malenstyn on the left and Nicolas Aube Kubel on the right side. Aube Kubel is in for Ivan Miroshnichenko who will be in the press box tonight as a healthy scratch.

It's the Capitals and the Red Wings coming up very soon. You can watch on ESPN or listen to John Walton on the call on Caps Radio 24/7 or 99.1 FM in the DMV market.