Spencer Carbery uses the Bruins' preseason game to get a first look at Pierre-Luc Dubois' new line

The Washington Capitals travel to Boston on Tuesday to face the Bruins in their second preseason game. Washington lost its first game 6-2 to the Philadelphia Flyers on Sunday, and many players from that loss will get a chance to turn things around at TD Garden.

Head Coach Spencer Carbery brought his playing group onto the ice for a morning workout at the MedStar Capitals Iceplex before flying to the East Coast. The second-year coach plans to take a close look at several combinations, including Pierre-Luc Dubois' trio, that he will likely use once the regular season begins.

Dubois spent all of training camp skating with Connor McMichael and Tom Wilson on his wings. Dubois has successfully combined with a winger of Wilson's archetype, skating over 663 five-on-five minutes with Josh Anderson for the Columbus Blue Jackets.

Carbery has previously explained that he paired Wilson with Dubois to help the latter quickly integrate into the team's system play. He will see how that works for the first time in live play against Boston, but he likes how the trio looked during practice and scrimmages.

“I feel like the chemistry between them is good, that the pucks are staying alive, that they're making good decisions, that (Dubois) is using his frame a lot to hold onto some pucks and get to the interior of the ice,” Carbery said. “There are a lot of positive things from that line so far in training camp.”

“We thought about what the line would look like in the summer and put Mikey there with some speed and skill … the chemistry is right there.”

Dubois expressed some of these thoughts before the game.

“I feel good,” Dubois said. “I think the most important thing is to get better every day and I think we're doing a good job of that. Mikey and Willy have helped a lot by teaching the system, habits, little things they like in the offensive and defensive zones. It's not going to be perfect right out of the gate, but as long as we're getting better every day, we're doing a good job.”

One of Washington's other key offseason additions, defenseman Matt Roy, will also make his preseason debut. Carbery had originally wanted to try Roy out with Rasmus Sandin as a pair, but Sandin is only now coming to DC for visa reasons, so Roy's first game will be alongside Martin Fehervary's.

The two defensemen played together at the start of training camp and Carbery says Roy showed exactly why the Capitals decided to give him a six-year, $34.5 million contract as a free agent.

“You can see why he's been so successful,” Carbery said. “The less you notice him normally, the better, because when you watch the video again, you think, 'Wow, great position, he defended well, he played a great puck there.' His game is just so calm, so reliable, and you know exactly what to expect from him in situations where we don't have the puck.

“And then when he gets the puck, he usually ends up in a really good spot. That was nice to see during training camp, and you can see why he's going to be an important part of our D-corps in a lot of different situations.”

In addition to Dubois' line and Roy's debut, the Capitals will see Hendrix Lapierre, Ivan Miroshnichenko, Andrew Cristall, Ethen Frank, Henrik Rybinski, Hardy Häman Aktell, Ethan Bear and Hunter Shepard in their second preseason games. Shepard will start the entire game in goal after splitting his first start with Clay Stevenson.

The battle for the few open roster spots is heating up. Carbery says he has spoken individually with some of the players who were part of the loss to Philadelphia and are also flying to Boston.

“As I said the other night after the game and confirmed in some conversations today, we were very nervous,” Carbery said. “It was the three o'clock game, the first game of the preseason, and they put pressure on themselves to perform and show what they can do.”

“For a lot of the guys, it was just a bad night. Hopefully, for the guys playing their second game, it's more like, 'Okay, I feel good. I've got that behind me and now I can do my best and show what I can do.' That takes a little weight off our shoulders.”

The Capitals will play the Bruins twice in the preseason. Boston's roster for the first game consists of very few regular NHL players. The most notable are Trent Frederic, Tyler Johnson, Matt Poitras, Brandon Carlo and Hampus Lindholm.

Washington's non-playing group practiced as usual on Tuesday ahead of another game Wednesday night against the New Jersey Devils, in which most of those players will likely be in action.