Dustin Brown on Ovechkin and how to beat the Capitals

Capitals’ Alex Ovechkin (photo: M. Zampelli)

With the Capitals in town for a game against the Kings tonight, it’s one of those rare opportunities to see Alex Ovechkin on the West Coast. Although he’s played over 500 games in the NHL, only six of them have come against the Kings – split evenly, with three on the road and three at home.

He has six points in those six games (two goals and four assists), with both goals coming in DC. Even so, Kings captain Dustin Brown sounded like a man with a plan when asked for his memories of playing the Capitals in the past and to share any thoughts on the game tonight…

“It’s always exciting when you have a player like Ovechkin coming in,” began Brown. “He’s one of the premier players in the league. We don’t play him very often. We’ve always played really good defense (vs the Caps in the past) and that’s why we’ve been successful against them. They’re pretty high-powered offensively. If we can just make them play defense – they don’t like doing that. I think that’s how we won last time. Ovechkin scored on the very first shift in Washington and we didn’t really give up any chances after that, and we dominated the game. So, we need to key in on a couple of their players and make sure we’re really good defensively.”

The game last year Brown referenced was won by the Kings 4-1. Jonathan Bernier was in net that day and only faced 23 shots. Coach Darryl Sutter is giving him the start again tonight.

As for Brown’s individual performance vs. the Capitals, he has one goal in seven career games – and it came at home on November 20, 2008.

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