After the Florida Panthers lost 4-1 to the San Jose Sharks last night, Matthew Tkachuk told the press, “Let’s be honest, we’re not in a good spot right now at all in the standings.”
The Panthers are exactly one point behind the Washington Capitals and have two games in hand.
With 32 games remaining in the season, the Capitals are facing a difficult reality: they could miss the playoffs in what could be Alex Ovechkin‘s 21st and final season in the NHL.
The Capitals currently sit 11th in the Eastern Conference with just 54 standings points from 50 games. They are on pace for 88 standings points this season after notching 111 in 2024-25, a 23-point drop, despite bringing back almost the same team from last year.
Eastern Conference wild-card race as of January 20, 2026
The Eastern Conference team that had the fewest points to make the postseason last year was the Montreal Canadiens, who got into the second wild-card spot with 91. In 2023-24, it was the Capitals themselves, who also had 91. MoneyPuck has the Caps’ playoff odds at 46.9 percent — a coin flip.
What sits immediately in front of the Capitals could decide their season. After losing to the Colorado Avalanche 5-2 at Ball Arena, the Capitals have five more games remaining on their season-long, six-game road trip.
The Capitals will get a respite at first, playing the NHL’s worst team, the Vancouver Canucks, on Wednesday and the Calgary Flames, the fifth-worst team in the league, on Friday. Then things ramp up. The Capitals take on the Edmonton Oilers on Saturday to complete a difficult back-to-back — you could even call that a scheduled loss. They then take on the Seattle Kraken on Tuesday and the Detroit Red Wings next Thursday — a team they’ve already lost to twice this season.
“We’ve got to move past [the Avalanche loss], and obviously we need to start getting some wins,” Dylan Strome said. “It’s an important rest of the road trip, and hopefully we can have a real positive rest of the road trip.”
The Capitals then conclude their pre-Olympic break play with games against the Carolina Hurricanes, New York Islanders, Philadelphia Flyers, and Nashville Predators — three of four are at home. The Hurricanes, Islanders, and Flyers (points percentage tiebreaker) are all ahead of them in the Metropolitan Division standings.
There is reason for hope. According to Tankathon, the Capitals have just the 16th-hardest schedule remaining, with their opponents having a combined points percentage of .566. The Caps are also set to get their best player, Tom Wilson, back imminently, while second-line centerman, Pierre-Luc Dubois, could return after the Olympic break with 23 games remaining on the schedule.
The Capitals could also make a move at the March 6 trade deadline and acquire some scoring to help with their vast problems at forward. General manager Chris Patrick has confirmed the team is in pursuit of a “higher-end, skilled winger.”
But the Capitals are running out of time. If there are any more surprise setbacks or long stretches of poor play — the team hasn’t won back-to-back games since the first week of December — this season could end prematurely, a lot earlier than anyone originally predicted heading into the year.
