Ilya Protas jammed many special moments into his short, first stint in the NHL with the Washington Capitals this past April.
Outside of making his NHL debut, recording his first NHL point, scoring his first NHL goal, and playing on the same line as his older brother, the top Caps prospect had one other memorable experience in his four-game run: lining up against legendary center Sidney Crosby.
Protas described what it was like to match up with Crosby during a recent Russian-language interview with BetNews. The two crossed paths when the Capitals hosted the Pittsburgh Penguins in DC on April 12, a day after the 19-year-old pivot recorded three points (1g, 2a) against the Crosby-less Penguins in Pittsburgh.
“Of course, I remember,” Protas said, as translated by Google Translate. I had two or three faceoffs against him. I remembered the first one I lost. I knew that when the linesman stands to his right, Crosby basically just slams his stick down. I was ready. I knew I needed pure reaction, try to strike first, because his wind-up takes time. So, I prepared for that, and he still cleanly won it right back to his defenseman. At that point, I realized you can prepare all you want, the faceoff statistics are still probably going negative.”
Protas ended up playing 4:43 of five-on-five ice time against Crosby in Washington’s 3-0 shutout victory. He couldn’t replicate the same scoring success that he had in Pittsburgh, but recorded three shots on goal, 15:45 of total ice time, and went 7-for-12 in the faceoff dot.
The latter statistic seems to be what Protas focused most on, as after losing the first draw to Crosby, he made sure to come out on top in the second.
“I won it,” Protas said. “That’s what stayed with me. Because when we first played Pittsburgh, I thought, ‘It’d be amazing to play against Crosby.’ But he didn’t play. They rested a lot of veteran guys. Then later they came to play us, and I finally got the matchup, won a draw. Definitely memorable.”
Overall, the teenage pivot went 19-for-42 in the dot in the NHL, so he still has some room to grow that side of his game. He finished his four games with the Capitals as a point-per-game player, notching four points (1g, 3a), showing what the organization can look forward to once he becomes a full-time member of the NHL roster.
Protas is expected to challenge for that full-time spot as soon as next fall’s training camp. He spent most of this past year in the AHL with the Hershey Bears, where he won Rookie of the Year after recording 66 points (29g, 37a) in 69 games.
If he does make the Capitals out of camp, he’ll have plenty more matchups with Crosby and all of the other stars around the NHL to look forward to.
