In a New Year’s Eve matinee, the Washington Capitals gave up five unanswered goals and lost to the Nashville Predators 6-3, suffering their first loss in 11 games.

The loss was a letdown, sure, but Alex Ovechkin found the positives after the game.

The new year, 2019, is Nicklas Backstrom’s number.

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Ovi reflecting on the success of 2018 and his hopes for 2019. Also, 2019 is going to be awesome because it’s “Nicklas Backstrom’s number.” 😉 (🎥: @capitals)

A post shared by RMNB (@rmnb_blog) on Dec 31, 2018 at 6:31pm PST

NHL.com’s Tom Gulitti asked Ovechkin to reflect on 2018 and surmised it was a pretty good year,

“Oh yeah,” Ovechkin said agreeing. “For organization, for my family, it’s been a great year, for fans as well. We going to try to do it again in ’19, Nick Backstrom’s number. We’ll see.”

Ovechkin also had good advice for the team on what to do with the blowout loss.

Alex Ovechkin on today's game: "Put it in the trash and move forward."

— Ian Oland (@ianoland) December 31, 2018

Never change, Ovi.

Full RMNB Coverage of Caps vs Predators