Washington Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin left his postgame media availability on a positive note despite the solemn circumstances of Sunday night’s 4-2 loss to the New York Rangers. After outlining his personal struggles in the four-game sweep, Ovechkin spoke highly of his team’s overall journey to the playoffs and his hopes for his and the club’s future.
The 38-year-old captain will enter his 20th season in the league next fall and has two more years on the extension he signed in 2021. While his primary goal of dethroning Wayne Gretzky as the NHL’s goal-scoring king remains, Ovechkin wants the grind to count for more than just regular-season success.
“I hope I’m still going to get a couple chances [to play in the playoffs],” Ovechkin said.
Ovechkin did not get on the scoresheet during this year’s four games, recording just five shots on goal. The Capitals have only been swept one other time since drafting Ovechkin, a second-round collapse to the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2011.
The taste of playoff hockey, albeit brief, this year was likely made sweeter by the fact that the Capitals missed out on the 2023 postseason completely. The team’s failure to qualify was just the fourth miss during Ovechkin’s tenure with the franchise.
This year’s chase of a playoff spot went to the season’s final day as the Capitals, under rookie bench boss Spencer Carbery, snuck in based on a tiebreaker with the Detroit Red Wings.
“I’m proud of this group of guys,” Ovechkin said. “We’ve been through lots of injuries, trade deadline, but we stick together and it showed the character of this group and that experience that the boys have this year it’s going to help.
“No one believed in this group that we’re going to make the playoffs this year, but we stick together, we fight for it until the last game of the season, and we get the opportunity to play in the playoffs. We still have young guys who played in Hershey last year and they take a huge step forward and they take that experience and next year those guys are going to be much better.”
The Capitals gave eight different skaters their playoff debut against the Rangers. Seven of those players played games for the 2023 Calder Cup champion Hershey Bears last season and the eighth, Ivan Miroshnichenko, will join back up with the Bears later this week to try and help them repeat.
As Ovechkin and the dwindling other pieces of the Capitals’ once Cup-contending core play further into the twilight of their careers, supporting them with youth will be crucial if The Great Eight wants to see the postseason again. The Capitals saw the first steps of that this year and will hope there are still further steps to be taken.
