BALLSTON, Va. - The Washington Capitals held a much less rigorous practice at Kettler Capitals Iceplex Thursday in preparation for Friday's game against the New Jersey Devils. All but one of the 22 active roster members participated; Marcus Johansson took a "maintenance day" according to a team spokesman.
Without Johansson - who will travel with the team to New Jersey - at practice, the reconfigured lines looked like this:
Alex Ovechkin - Mathieu Perreault - Troy Brouwer
Brooks Laich - Nicklas Backstrom - Alexander Semin
Jason Chimera - Cody Eakin - Joel Ward
Matt Hendricks - Jeff Halpern - Mike Knuble
All seven defensemen also participated, including Mike Green, who reiterated after practice that he's feeling better.
"I'm getting better each day," Green said. "Finally I think I'm getting close. We'll see what the docs say today and tomorrow and we'll go from there."
Head coach Bruce Boudreau said that he is "more optimistic every day" that Green will return soon, but Green is still "questionable" for Friday's game.
"I guess if he played Friday, we'd see how he was Friday and make a determination after that," Boudreau said. "There's never any, 'Well, he's playing both for sure, he's playing one for sure.' If he doesn't feel good enough in Friday's skate, then we'll put it off and hopefully he'll be there to go Saturday."