A Historic Quest Disguises the Washington Capitals' Many Problems

The Washington Capitals are a fascinating team. For decades, the team was snake bit. I still remember their Stanley Cup Final appearance in 1998, but it resulted in zero games won, and they were desperately looking to get back there. Then the 2005 draft happened, and that's when he joined the fray. Alexander Ovechkin. Talk about hitting the jackpot. Both he and Sidney Crosby were part of that same draft, but while Ovechkin was looked at as more of a star between the two, Crosby was the one racking up the hardware--winning three Stanley Cups while Ovechkin couldn't get past the second round of the playoffs.

Finally, on June 7, 2018, the Capitals finally get over the proverbial humps, and hoist the Stanley Cup, defeating the expansion Vegas Golden Knights in five games. It was an absolutely joyous moment for the team, especially Ovechkin, as the monkey was off his back. However, with each season that has passed, that 2018 Cup is becoming more and more distant. The Capitals haven't won a series since that Cup; the following year saw Washington ousted in a seven-game opening round series against the Carolina Hurricanes. The 2020 "bubble" playoffs saw the Capitals participate in the Round Robin, but they were defeated in the Eastern Conference Quarterfinals by the New York Islanders. The shortened 2020-21 season saw the Capitals suffer another first round exit, this time at the hands of the Boston Bruins.

This season is the latest chapter in Ovechkin's pursuit of history: the all-time goals record. The man known as the "Great Eight" has moved steadily up the list in the past few seasons; in fact, this season has seen him move past Marcel Dionne and Brett Hull on the list. Ovechkin has 762 career goals, good enough for fourth on the all-time list. He is close to Jaromir Jagr's total of 766, and he's not that far behind Gordie Howe's total of 801, but the magic number is 894, the total racked up by The Great One himself, Wayne Gretzky. This season, Ovechkin has 63 points (32 G/31 A), serving as one of the high scorers in the league, as usual.

Ovechkin's pursuit of history appears to be the main story regarding the Capitals, and while it is a great story, it does help make some forget about the lingering problems that the Caps are facing. Their team's playoff push has been a rocky one; they sit in a playoff position--being placed in one of the Eastern Conference's Wild Card slots. However, while the East's lack of depth this season would definitely keep the Capitals from falling off, they still face some bad problems.

One thing plaguing the Capitals is their power play, it has been a disaster. Their PP percentage is 15.7, which is 28th in the NHL and last among teams above the playoff line this season. Washington has scored 25 power play goals, with Ovechkin leading the way with eight. Their penalty kill is a little bit better--17th in the league with a percentage of 79.3, and scoring six shorthanded goals. Scoring depth has been a problem as well, while Ovechkin's 32 goals lead the team, Tom Wilson and Evgeny Kuznetsov are tied for second with 15 each--meaning that the two of them together haven't matched Ovechkin's total.

I've seen my share of goaltenders from the Capitals; names such as Semyon Varlamov, Philipp Grubauer, and Braden Holtby. The current netminder for Washington is Ilya Samsonov, and this season, he is 17-8-3 with a 2.88 GAA, a .904 SV%, and three shoutouts. This is Samsonov's second season as the Capitals' starter, and he has done well in net--though there was that bad error in the playoffs against Boston. Samsonov's backup is Vitek Vanacek, and his numbers: 10-6-5, 2.39 GAA, .915 SV%, and two shutouts. So far, the goaltending has been pretty good for Washington. Could it be better? Perhaps. But it's not a total disaster.

While the Capitals sit safely above the overall playoff line at 28-16-9 and 65 points, they are five points behind the Metropolitan Division's playoff line, the Top 3 in the division. The third place spot is held by the Pittsburgh Penguins, and the division is led by the Carolina Hurricanes. The Capitals are quite close behind those two teams and the New York Rangers, and there's plenty of time to climb the division ladder and (possibly) move past all of them. However, in order to do so, things need to improve. The power play needs to start producing. Goals from players not named Alex Ovechkin need to be racked up in bunches. Finally, they need to stop trading wins and losses; they've been doing a lot of that lately. If none of these things improve, Capitals fans will only be left with two distant memories: the 2018 Stanley Cup and Ovechkin becoming the all-time goal scorer. That's it.

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