The Washington Capitals have been a fixture in the NHL playoffs in 14 of the last 16 seasons. The 2022-23 campaign ended with the Caps missing the post season festivities, and the franchise has had a long summer off to think on that miss.
Alex Ovechkin #8 and Dylan Strome #17 of the Washington Capitals battle Lukas Sedak #23 and Justin Braun #61 of the Philadelphia Flyers in front of Flyers Goalie Carter Hart #79
The Caps parted ways with their head coach, Peter Laviolette, in the off season. Laviolette found his way to New York as the Rangers’ new bench boss, and the Caps filled the open slot with Spencer Carbery who is assuming his first head coaching job in the NHL.
Carbery is no stranger to the Capitals system, he was the head coach of the Caps’ AHL affiliate Hershey Bears. He was also an assistant coach with the Toronto Maple Leafs before signing on with the Caps.
“You can just feel it from talking to not only our leadership group and our veteran players, but all the way down our lineup,” Carbery said on NHL.com. . “You can just feel that last year left a bitter taste in our group’s mouth and that’s great because you’ve got a hungry coaching staff coming in with a lot to prove, and a group that has had a lot of success in the past and has had phenomenal careers throughout our roster, but also have a lot to prove coming into the year, which is exciting.”
As with any team, the Capitals are aging, and their heavy lifters are the ones seemingly aging the quickest.
Washington’s Alex Ovechkin will turn 38 this month, and T.J. Oshie is 36; Add in the likes of Nicklas Backstrom, 35; John Carlson, 33; Evgeny Kuznetsov, 31; and Tom Wilson, 29, and the Caps are in need of an infusion of youth and 20-somethings to give them more speed and future success.
In the interim, the Caps traded away expiring contracts including Dmitry Orlov and Erik Gustafsson, Garnet Hathaway, Marcus Johansson and Lars Eller. It wasn’t so much an effort to bring in youth younger players as it was to gain some cap space. Â 
In the off season, the Caps added Max Pacioretty to a one-year deal, and traded for Joel Edmundson.
In the 2023 Entry Draft, the Caps selected
Ryan Leonard with their first pick. The 18-year old iced for USA Hockey National Team Development Program Under-18 in 2022-23.
“I’m not comparing him to Tom Wilson, but he’s got that kind of swagger,” Capitals assistant general manager, player personnel Chris Patrick said after the draft. “He’s willing to compete. He’s willing to get in guys’ faces. He’s willing to challenge guys.”
Leonard is not expected in the Caps’ roster for another two seasons.
Current Bears’ players, Connor McMichael, 22; Aliaksei Protas, 22; and Hendrix Lapierre, 21; Alexander Alexeyev, 23; and Vincent Iorio, 20, are expected to get some critical ice time in the preseason and should be tested in training camp in the hopes of impressing their former head coach, Carbery.
Iono and Ivan Miroshnichenko are expected to make the Washington roster this season. Miroshnichenko iced in the KHL with Avengard Omsk in their past campaign year.
In goal, Darcy Kuemper will be leaned on this season to carry the Caps through the tougher portions of their schedule when younger, faster teams provide the challenge.
The problem for the Capitals is they reside in the Metropolitan Division which is locked in a perpetual arms race with few teams taking a breather to reassess their in-house talent because they simply don’t have time or a fan base willing to give them any leeway on a rebuild.
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Carbery will need to have consistent scoring from Ovechkin and the rest of the aging core of this team. Is it too much to expect the Caps’ stars to play like they are 5 years younger than they are, or can the tentative youth movement supply the grit to get them back to the playoffs in the spring of ’24?
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