Ilya Protas took his first steps in the NHL on Wednesday night.
The 19-year-old center made his NHL debut against the Toronto Maple Leafs at ScotiaBank Arena. Protas spent the majority of the night centering the team’s 700-pound second line, in between his older brother, Aliaksei Protas, and Tom Wilson.
Protas netted his first NHL point late in the Capitals’ 4-0 win, assisting on a Cole Hutson empty-net goal with just 3:50 remaining in regulation. After receiving a feed from Wilson in the team’s defensive zone, he found his older brother free in the neutral zone, and Big Pro laid out a pass to the hard-charging Hutson for an easy finish.
With the assist, he became the 42nd player in franchise history to record a point in their NHL debut.
After Hutson put the puck in the net, Aliaksei hung around the goal to pick up the milestone biscuit for his little brother. The two then shared an emotional hug on the bench.
“Rookie lap, first shift, and obviously the game, we got two points, the point, and I shared the point with my brother,” Protas said postgame. “A little bit of everything.”
Ilya and Aliaksei are now the fourth set of brothers in Capitals history to play together, joining Peter and Chris Ferraro, Dale and Mark Hunter, and Kelly and Kevin Miller. The younger Protas, a 2024 third-round pick, is just the 20th player from his draft class to make their debut.
“When I was dreaming about it, I was thinking like, yeah, I probably have to be drafted by the same organization,” Protas said. “I have to get in the lineup, and I have to get in the lineup with him. It was like something, I couldn’t really think of it. It never came up to my mind.
“But when we get to the same organization, obviously, you start thinking about it more. And when I was playing in the AHL this season, during it, you obviously were thinking about it. Because it’s like one step (away). And yeah, I’m so happy for a dream come true.”
Here’s a full recap of Little Pro’s night.
Capitals tunnel and rookie lap
Protas was one of the first players out of the Capitals’ locker room to join them for their usual pregame shenanigans. He was joined by club captain Alex Ovechkin, who shared a few words in Russian with the rookie center.
Once the rest of their teammates joined them in the tunnel, Protas was sent out for his customary rookie lap.
The team regularly makes its rookies go without a helmet for the first few laps of warmups in their first game, and Protas was not exempt.
Starting the game with Alex Ovechkin
After warmups, the Capitals had fellow rookie forward Ryan Leonard read out the team’s starting lineup. While the Protas brothers were slated to play with Wilson, Caps head coach Spencer Carbery gave them the special honor of lining up for the first shift of the game with Ovechkin.
“Yeah, it’s unbelievable,” Protas said. “When the boys read the starting lineup, and I heard me, my brother, and the Big Man, I was so nervous and shaky for a bit. It was special. Couldn’t believe it for a second after that shift.
“That’s just things to remember. What I’m going to tell my kids about. That’s a special, special thing for me.”
Given Ovechkin’s impending decision on the future of his NHL career, Wednesday night’s game could have also been his last as a visiting player in Toronto.
The line’s first shift lasted just 17 seconds. They iced the puck almost immediately to start the game and then were replaced in the defensive zone once goaltender Logan Thompson made a save and froze the puck.
Finding his way at five-on-five and on the power play
Protas was given the top-six assignment in his debut and responsibilities on the team’s second power-play unit. He got an early chance to play with the Capitals up a man after Toronto’s Max Domi took a two-minute roughing penalty just 7:53 into regulation.
Overall, Protas played 2:09 of power-play ice time in the win, fourth-most on the team.
Protas then spent his own time in the penalty box, taking his first career penalty, a minor for hooking, at 5:56 into the second period.
At the end of the game, Protas finished with 15:37 of total ice time. During his minutes, he recorded one assist, one shot block, and went 6-8 in the faceoff circle.
With him on the ice at five-on-five, the Capitals finished with a positive differential in scoring chances (+2), and they did not give up a single high-danger chance to the Maple Leafs.
“I thought he was solid,” Carbery said. “You could tell the nerves were there early in the game. I thought he settled in, made a few plays, had a good scoring chance, took one to the net. You can see the skill set. Thought it was a good first night for him to get his feet wet in the National Hockey League.”
Photo with his line and milestone puck
Protas posed with his first-point puck after the game. It took his older brother seven games to notch his first point with the Capitals during the 2021-22 season.
“It was so much fun,” Wilson said. “It truly is a privilege to play with both those guys. They’re such phenomenal people, and they’re such phenomenal kids, and such phenomenal players. I’ll look back at that being a pretty proud moment of my career, being able to play with two kids from a small town in Belarus. It’s pretty special, and I hope it’s the first of many points as a line. He did a great job. It was a lot of fun.”
Protas is the third Capitals player to make their NHL debut this season and the second to notch their first career point. Hutson scored an empty-net goal in his debut, while Protas’s good friend, Bogdan Trineyev, played in two December games but could not find the scoresheet.
