It might be an early start at Verizon Center and only a handful of days into November, but there's no reason to believe that today's tilt with the Philadelphia Flyers will lack any of the emotion that's laced this rivalry in recent seasons. The Flyers played last night, defeating the Islanders, 2-1, for their sixth straight win, so we'll see if that impacts the contest at all.

"It's early but both teams don't particularly like each other even though we don't play each other very much," Coach Bruce Boudreau said. "I would think both teams would be passionate about tonight's game."

Braden Holtby led the Capitals out on to the ice for warmup so it appears he'll be making his first NHL start against the Flyers this evening.

In his pre-game comments to the media, Boudreau clarified that the team does view Marcus Johansson's assignment to Hershey as a conditioning stint intended to get the rookie center a few games after not playing since Oct. 21.

"We weren't going to play him today, so he'll go for two games unless needed, and then he'll come right back," Boudreau said. "It's not sending him down, it's conditioning."

Forwards
Ovechkin-Backstrom-Semin
Laich-Fleischmann-Knuble
Chimera-Gordon-Fehr
Hendricks-Steckel-Bradley

Defense
Schultz-Green
Alzner-Carlson
Erskine-Sloan

Goal
Holtby
Neuvirth

Scratches: D.J. King, Tom Poti (groin), Semyon Varlamov (groin)