Washington opens its NHL season Friday against Stanley Cup champion Carolina.
When the Washington Capitals left the ice in April after narrowly missing the postseason, no one, not even the coaching staff or front office, knew whether Alex Ovechkin would return for another season.
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Now, as they prepare for Friday’s season opener at the Carolina Hurricanes, Ovechkin is back. And he’s surrounded by a level of talent and depth they arguably haven’t had since the Capitals won the Stanley Cup in 2018.
The Capitals made significant offseason additions by acquiring forwards Alex Tuch and Jordan Kyrou in trades and signing forward Boone Jenner and defenseman Vincent Desharnais. They have 11 players who have scored at least 20 goals in a season and five who have done it more than five times — led, of course, by Ovechkin, who has done it in each of his 21 seasons.
“It doesn’t matter how good you are on paper,” said Ovechkin, who has not declared whether this is his last season. “The most important thing is you have to have real good relationships. You have to be good in the locker room, support each other and work hard out there.”
The Capitals’ quest to return to the postseason will take longer this year. With an extended season, the schedule now spanning 84 games instead of 82, training camps were shortened and the preseason slate was condensed to four games.
To combat that, camp looked a little different this year. The Capitals put their NHL group in the same training session from day one, setting up their lines early so the team could have as much time as possible to jell. They also took a trip to Annapolis, Maryland, where they spent two days golfing, watching football and bonding off the ice before the grind begins.
“You just don’t have as much time to get your group together, create that chemistry, get everybody on the same page, communication,” said Coach Spencer Carbery, who signed a multiyear extension in June. “With the new faces as well, I think it was important to get basically our NHL group together as quickly as we possibly could.”
The Capitals are also bigger and taller, with nine players who are at least 6-foot-4 and 200 pounds — another factor they think will help in a longer season.
“It’s honestly, like, laughable when you go on the ice and see how big we are,” said forward Tom Wilson, who is 6-foot-4 and 230 pounds. “They’re big guys who can move. … You’re big, but you’re not sacrificing any skill or speed, which is probably always a good thing.”
While Ovechkin and Wilson will lead the team as captain and alternate captain again — and are also the only two remaining players from the 2018 team — the Capitals have exceptional young talent to build around.
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Ryan Leonard signed an eight-year, $84 million extension. The 21-year-old winger scored 20 goals and had 25 assists in his rookie season.
Forward Justin Sourdif, who scored 15 goals last season, also signed an eight-year extension, worth $50.8 million.
“My goal with both of those players was to try to have them as Caps for as long as possible,” General Manager Chris Patrick said. “If that meant an eight-year deal now or a shorter deal and you follow it up with a longer six- or seven-year deal, that was my end goal. … It’s something as a franchise we can do because our ownership’s invested in this team, in the city, and it’s a luxury we definitely don’t take for granted.”
At just 20 years old, defenseman Cole Hutson will take on a big role on a unit that will play at least the first half of the season without Rasmus Sandin, who tore his ACL in April but is skating again.
Center Ilya Protas, the younger brother of left winger Aliaksei, is also expected to take on a lot of responsibility in his rookie season. The Protas brothers are expected to be paired on the same line to help ease Ilya’s transition into the NHL.
“His brother being there to help him, to communicate with him, he talks to him constantly,” Carbery said. “… As a rookie playing at the center position on a team that has made a lot of changes, that is expecting to win from day one, I think that could potentially really help him early in the season, getting and feeling as comfortable as he can.”
The road back to the postseason won’t be easy, and they’ll get tested right away against the reigning Stanley Cup champion Hurricanes. The Capitals know the expectations placed on them. And they are ready, Wilson said, to show they are worthy of the heightened anticipation.
“We have a window right now with a lot of really solid players locked in for a bunch of years,” Wilson said. “We’re hungry. It’s going to be that time where you can’t take no for an answer — like, you have to go out there and get it done. There’s no excuses anymore.”
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