As he is wont to do, Penguins coach Mike Sullivan shed little light Saturday on which goaltender he might start in Sunday’s road game against the Washington Capitals at Capital One Arena.
Tristan Jarry never has played the Capitals, and Matt Murray has not played in roughly two weeks because of the NHL’s All-Star break. His last appearance came Jan. 19 in a 4-3 home shootout win against the Boston Bruins.
“We’re just trying to make decisions game to game but also having the big picture in mind as far as when we’re trying to manage the workloads of the goaltenders and trying to win that game right in front of us,” Sullivan said. “It’s just played itself out that way because we haven’t played Washington this year. We believe we have a real strong goaltending tandem, and we’re going to try to utilize that to our advantage to try to help this team win games.”
Capitals coach Todd Reirden announced to Washington reporters 22-year-old rookie Ilya Samsonov is scheduled to start. In 20 game this season, Samsonov is 16-2-1 with a 2.12 goals-against average, a .925 save percentage and one shutout.
Samsonov never hs faced the Penguins.
