With a 2-1 win over the Philadelphia Flyers on Tuesday night, the Capitals returned to the NHL playoffs, clinching the final wild card spot in the Eastern Conference, essentially winning Game 7 of Round 0. In doing so, they secured a date with the giants New York Rangers. Exhale because the spot was deserved and the ride was worth it. Now fasten your seat belt again.
But enjoy it a lot: a team that dealt with underperformance and injuries, that banished Stanley Cup hero Evgeny Kuznetsov and got better because of it, that still sold out to the trade deadline because the immediate future looked bleak – this group slipped through. No, sorry . This group has won its last three matches in four days to barge when no other result would have worked.
“Unreal,” said Alex Ovechkin, whose first-period goal was the 31st of his season, the 853rd of his career and, given the way the Caps have been scoring lately, felt like something of a miracle .
“We are fighting against a lot of things that are happening in [the] deadline, injuries, Kuzy,” he continued. “But I think the confidence inside the dressing room was huge. We enjoyed this process. It is special. This is why we play hockey.
And that’s why we watch.
Put success aside for a moment. The madness of how this happened can hardly be overstated. With two points on Tuesday – in regulation or overtime – the Capitals would clinch last place. But to stay alive, the Flyers needed a regulation victory – and some help in the form of a Montreal victory over Detroit.
That meant a late tie — and the possibility of overtime, in which the Caps would earn their 90th point, eliminating Philadelphia — essentially put the Flyers in a deficit.
So for Philadelphia coach John Tortorella, goaltender Samuel Ersson’s withdrawal would come earlier than usual – with more than three minutes left and the score tied. Except at almost the exact same time, nearly 400 miles away, Detroit scored with five seconds left to force overtime in Montreal. The Red Wings were right. The Flyers were eliminated. Ersson left the net anyway – and Caps veteran TJ Oshie, playing with a chronically damaged rear end, deposited the game-winning goal into the empty net.
How appropriate – how wildly appropriate – for this group.
“Almost every game was game seven for us,” Ovechkin said. “Sometimes we haven’t scored points and we’re always in a battle, and then it was a crazy situation until tonight.”
“I got information about the Detroit game right after they scored their empty-net goal,” Tortorella said. “I think it happened pretty close together.”
Incredibly close to each other – and for Washington, incredibly lucky. Because this team — which has scored two goals or fewer in 42 of 82 games this year, fourth in the NHL — didn’t seem capable of forcing another if the game remained at five-on-five. That scoring difficulty contributed to the Caps’ minus-37 goal differential, the worst of any playoff team this century.
They are limited, of course. And yet, there is so much joy.
“You could see the faces in that room, whether you’re John Carlson or Hendrix Lapierre, Connor McMichael, ‘O,’ they all have different things,” said first-year coach Spencer Carbery, who was not so impressive in methodology and message. “They are all at different stages of their careers and lives. But you could tell, regardless of your situation, whether you were playing your first year, like a lot of our guys, or you were playing your 17th season, this group – you could tell how much they wanted to find ways to win every night .
It’s so striking what qualifying skin of the teeth means for this roster compared to how those old juggernaut Capitals teams rushed to the playoffs. During the 2018 Cup year, the most notable aspect of the Caps’ celebration after their first-round victory over Columbus was how low-key they felt. It was a business trip. The second round was expected. What was important was on the horizon, beyond.
These Caps are not these Caps. And that’s okay.
“The momentum is on our side,” Oshie said. “I think there are a lot of players in this room who maybe haven’t made the playoffs or haven’t even played in the playoffs who are starting to learn dedication, focus, intensity and selflessness it takes to play playoff hockey.
This is because they have been playing this style for over a month.
Before the season, the key to the Capitals being the best version of themselves was the return to form of Kuznetsov, the talented but exasperating center who was arguably Washington’s best player during the Cup run. They included a return to health for franchise mainstay Nicklas Backstrom, who had to return from hip resurfacing surgery.
And they likely include a breakout year from guard Darcy Kuemper, signed a season earlier to a five-year, $26.25 million contract to bring stability to a position where Washington had little appreciation.
The results: Kuznetsov was the worst version of himself, dragging the team down, collecting just 17 points in 43 games. He was placed on waivers, then traded. Backstrom’s physical limitations quickly became too much. He left the game in November with just one point in eight games. And Kuemper was eventually replaced in net by standout backup Charlie Lindgren, who started 14 of the Caps’ final 15 games and was considered by Carbery to be “arguably our MVP.”
So the group that came together in the fall hoping to get back to the playoffs isn’t the one that ultimately landed there. Tuesday night’s lineup included defenseman Dylan McIlrath, days shy of his 32nd birthday but playing in only his 75th NHL game, the captain of the Caps’ top minor league franchise. Damn if he didn’t assist on Ovechkin’s goal. It included 21-year-old Vincent Iorio, a 2021 draft pick who was playing in his ninth NHL game. This is a hybrid roster for a franchise in transition, with the old core winding down and a new core forming – maybe.
“It’s amazing just because the journey hasn’t been easy,” Lindgren said. “…It’s such a privilege to play for these guys.”
They will be underdogs, and big underdogs, against Rangers, winners of the Presidents’ Trophy. The kids on this team won’t remember the burden New York has to bear, but maybe some old heads will. The 2010 Capitals won the same trophy awarded to the team with the best record in the NHL. They lost in the first round to eighth-seeded Montreal. The 2016 and 2017 versions of the Caps earned Presidents’ Trophy status and were unable to advance out of the second round.
The point: nothing is guaranteed. Washington’s roster isn’t what it once was or even what anyone expected it to be this season. But the kids who could be part of a future core — McMichael, Lapierre, Beck Malenstyn, Aliaksei Protas and others — have that chance after a season in which so much went wrong.
“Where we are is very, very valuable for development,” Carbery said. “But now you want to achieve it. Now we don’t just want [say], ‘Okay great.’ We want to play well. …And everyone’s going to say, ‘We don’t belong here, and the goal differential, blah, blah, blah.’ This will be the story. And that’s very good. It’s justified. It is a fact. [But] I know this group won’t just make the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
When the horn sounded Tuesday night, Carlson — a veteran of 1,009 NHL games, all clad in a Caps sweater — raised his fist and cried, then walked toward Lindgren for an emphatic hug. The norm is no longer what it used to be. But for these Capitals, this season has been a success. Now the real fun begins.
