Game 17: 17-7-6-3 (PTS-W-L-OT)
Tuesday November 13, 2018 Washington Capitals @ Minnesota Wild
Place: Xcel Energy Center
Time: 8:00 p.m. ET
TV: NBCSWA, FS-N
Radio: 106.7 The Fan, Capitals Radio 24/7
NHL.COM for Live Box Score
Last Game: Sun November 11 Capitals Lost 4-1 against Coyotes
Next Game: Wed November 14, 8:00pm ET Capitals @ Jets
8-Ovechkin 92-Kuznetsov 43-Wilson
13-Vrana 19-Bäckström 77-Oshie
65-Burakovsky 20-Eller 10-Connolly
18-Stephenson 72-Boyd 25-Smith-Pelly
9-Orlov 74-Carlson
6-Kempny 2-Niskanen
29-Djoos 22-Bowey
1-Copley (starter)
70-Holtby
-- SCRATCH --
23-Jaskin
55-Ness ? ? ?
26-Dowd
34-Siegenthaler
-- INJURED RESERVE --
44-Orpik [lower-body injury]
-- SUSPENDED --
-- 1st Powerplay Unit --
77-Oshie 19-Bäckström 92-Kuznetsov
8-Ovechkin 74-Carlson
-- 2nd Powerplay Unit --
13-Vrana 10-Connolly 20-Eller
2-Niskanen 9-Orlov
Referees: Kyle Rehman (#10), Tom Chmielewski (#18)
Linesmen: Travis Gawryletz (#67), David Brisebois (#96)
1st Period06:33 GOAL 9-Orlov, assists 20-Eller & 65-Burakovsky 1-0 WSH
19:32 GOAL 43-Wilson, assists 9-Orlov & 92-Kuznetsov 2-0 WSH
2nd Period03:13 GOAL 65-Burakovsky, assists 20-Eller & 10-Connolly 3-0 WSH
11:57 Wild GOAL Koivu, unassisted 3-1 WSH
3rd Period07:23 GOAL 9-Orlov, assists 8-Ovechkin & 2-Niskanen 4-1 WSH
09:48 GOAL 77-Oshie, assists 19-Bäckström & 13-Vrana 5-1 WSH
14:08 Wild PP GOAL Parise, assists Dumba 7 Foligno 5-2 WSH
FINAL: 5-2 WSH
By Isabelle Khurshudyan November 13 at 12:45 PM
Capitals forward Tom Wilson’s suspension reduced to 14 games
Tom Wilson will not have to serve his original 20-game suspension. (Nick Wass/AP)
ST. PAUL, Minn. — Washington Capitals forward Tom Wilson’s 20-game suspension for an illegal check to the head has been reduced to 14 games by neutral arbitrator Shyam Das, the NHL announced Tuesday, ending a six-week appeal process. Wilson has already served 16 games of the original ban, so he will be in the lineup against the Minnesota Wild on Tuesday night, skating with Evgeny Kuznetsov and Alex Ovechkin on Washington’s top line.
The six-game reduction also saves Wilson roughly $378,000 in lost salary. The NHL Department of Player Safety suspended him on Oct. 3 for a hit on St. Louis’s Oskar Sundqvist in the teams’ preseason finale. That marked Wilson’s fourth suspension in 105 games, including preseason and playoffs. As per the collective bargaining agreement, Wilson’s first appeal through the league’s players' association was heard by Commissioner Gary Bettman, and on Oct. 25, Bettman upheld the 20-game ban.
As part of Bettman’s 31-page ruling, he wrote that a 20-game suspension might “be the only effective way to deter Mr. Wilson’s future ‘bad conduct.’ "
“I hope that this decision will serve as an appropriate ‘wake-up call’ to Mr. Wilson, causing him to reevaluate and make positive changes to his game,” Bettman wrote.
[Capitals' Tom Wilson on life while suspended: ‘There’s a lot of learning’]
Wilson then appealed to a neutral arbitrator, a route historically more favorable to players, and it took Das nearly two weeks to reach his conclusion. Das agreed with Bettman that Wilson’s hit violated Rule 48, with Sundqvist’s head being the main point of contact, and that the contact was avoidable, but he found fault with the Department of Player Safety’s rationale for a 20-game ban. In the first appeal hearing with Bettman, George Parros, the head of the Department of Player Safety, said Wilson’s three-game suspension for an illegal check to the head of Pittsburgh’s Zach Aston-Reese in the second round of the playoffs should be treated as six regular-season games. Because the league punishes repeat offenders more seriously, Parros then multiplied that by three for Wilson’s fourth suspension, and added two games for Sundqvist’s injury, a concussion and shoulder injury, to land at 20 games.
But in reviewing the past suspensions of Raffi Torres in 2012 and Patrick Kaleta in 2013, Das concluded that there wasn’t enough evidence to support Parros’s multiplier of three. As a result, he used a multiplier of two to get to 12 games, then added two more for the injuries.
“The hitting aspect of the game is definitely changing a little bit, and I’ve got to be smart out there and I’ve got to play within the rules,” Wilson said last week. “And at the end of the day, no one wants to be in the situation that I’m in right now. I’ve got to change something because obviously it’s not good to be out and not helping your team.”
The players union had also argued in its appeal that NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly improperly attempted to influence the Department of Player Safety as it weighed Wilson’s case, citing an email Daly sent to Parros in late September.
“Looks like a big one. The Emergency Assistance Fund is going to be happy,” Daly wrote in the email, referring to Wilson’s forfeited salary.
But Das wrote that he was “not persuaded” Daly had attempted to improperly influence the process, noting that the deputy commissioner had already been copied on emails in which Department of Player Safety personnel argued that Wilson had violated Rule 48.
Wilson is coming off a career season, with 14 goals and 21 assists playing on a first line opposite Ovechkin, and the team rewarded his performance with a six-year, $31 million deal this past summer. He’s expected to resume his first-line post immediately, but after what the Department of Player Safety has called “an unprecedented frequency of suspensions” in its history, Wilson will be under a spotlight to change his big-hitting, physical style.
Read more on the Capitals:As Capitals search for consistency, latest experiment is shuffling defensive pairingsAs the NHL gets younger, vets note Fortnite, other video games encroaching on team bondingPlaying with Alex Ovechkin and Evgeny Kuznetsov should be easy, right? It’s not. Here’s why.‘No room for hate’: Caps’ raffle winner donates $19,000 jackpot to Pittsburgh Jewish community
