The Washington Capitals finished 28th in the league in goals scored this past season, the only playoff team occupying a spot in the bottom ten of the NHL. At the end of the regular season, the Capitals had just two players with 20 or more goals on their roster, Alex Ovechkin (31) and Dylan Strome (27).
Head coach Spencer Carbery spoke about his team’s issues getting on the scoresheet countless times throughout their 82-game schedule, even outlining how hard they had to work simply to get shots on goal let alone shots in the goal. The quickest way to alleviate those problems moving forward would be to bring in players this offseason who have proven they can score at an elite level. Unfortunately, those players don’t grow on trees or are readily available on the open market.
“That is the most challenging thing for us as an organization as we go through this: How do you acquire 40-goal, 100-point guys without doing it through the draft?” Carbery said Tuesday. “That’s a challenge organizationally we’ll get to work on.”
Capitals general manager Brian MacLellan has been open about his desire to add a young, top-six winger to his group for well over a year now. According to MacLellan, he sent out a few “aggressive” offers at the deadline for players the organization liked but the eventual final move never materialized.
Carbery, naturally as the team’s head coach, has been less willing to speak about what he believes the team needs to add but offered some specifics during his Breakdown Day press conference. The rookie bench boss started out the year emphasizing adding “pace” to the Capitals and that hasn’t changed around seven months later.
“Probably when you start to break down the individual player what attributes do we need to add, size on the backend I think about, speed is right up there,” he said. “You know what sticks out is [Hendrix Lapierre], right? Lappy’s foot speed jumps off the page when you’re standing there on the bench as I’m sure it jumps out to our fans and people watching. His foot speed makes a difference – we need more of that inside of our lineup, no question.”
Without the injection of new, offensive blood into the lineup, the Capitals would be again left leaning on an old, smaller core of stars and still-developing youngsters to shoulder the scoring burden. While players like Connor McMichael, Aliaksei Protas, and Hendrix Lapierre did take certain leaps this past year, Carbery believes it would be unfair to expect them to become superstar producers.
All three players had hot streaks during the campaign but had trouble finding consistency during their first real, full seasons primarily playing in the team’s top-six forward group. McMichael finished with 33 points (18g, 15a) in 80 games, the top mark for the team’s under-23 contingent.
“I don’t want to get too much into the upstairs and management stuff but to thrust and expect Connor McMichael to become Brayden Point, I don’t think that’s fair,” Carbery said. “To score 40 goals and be a 100-point guy – I just don’t think that’s fair. Am I saying that Connor can’t do that? I’m not but to say and expect him and Lappy to be hundred-point scorers, those are very, very unique players.
“We’ll see where their path goes and we’ll help them develop and grow and that’s my job. Can they be 25-30 goal guys? Can they play third, second line? Yeah, I think they can and if they really pop maybe that isn’t too unrealistic but I just think we have to be careful and temper expectations. Just because someone is picked in the first round [they aren’t] going to be Brayden Point or Nikita Kucherov or Artemi Panarin.”
After selling at the deadline for the second consecutive season, the Capitals head into the 2024 summer with a cupboard full of potentially enticing draft selections. They’re also set to save salary cap space due to Nicklas Backstrom’s de facto long-term injured reserve retirement, moving Evgeny Kuznetsov’s large contract, and some possible unrestricted free-agent departures.
Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman also reported Monday that he believes the Capitals will try to move goaltender Darcy Kuemper and his sizable $5.25 million salary. Clearing even more room could lay the foundation for one or two significantly roster-altering moves for the types of players Carbery and MacLellan clearly desire.
