Dylan McIlrath was two distinct people during the Washington Capitals‘ preseason game against the Philadelphia Flyers in Hershey: a family man and a hockey enforcer looking for blood.
McIlrath, who captained the AHL’s Hershey Bears from 2022-24, had a sweet surprise waiting for him on Monday night: his wife Melissa, daughter Marley, and son Wesley had made the trip up to Pennsylvania, greeting him on the glass during warmups.
That cuteness only lasted so long, however. Once the game started, Friendly Dad Dylan McIlrath was nowhere to be found. And when he laid a big hit on Flyers prospect Noah Powell, drawing the ire of Garrett Wilson, McIlrath stepped up to the challenge and dropped the gloves.
The two experienced fighters put on a show, landing a series of heavy punches to the delight of fans at Giant Center. Neither player managed to come out on top before officials separated them, sending them off to the penalty box.
Not only did the fight get a rise out of the crowd, but it also appeared to startle Flyers prospect Ty Murchison, who watched the scene with his jaw dropped.
McIlrath and Wilson have history at the AHL level, previously getting into an even more energetic fight just 18 seconds after puck drop when the Hershey Bears faced the Lehigh Valley Phantoms in April 2022.
The Capitals poked fun at the dichotomy between McIlrath’s love for his family and his bloodthirsty on-ice persona in an Instagram post.
Not only did McIlrath hold his own in Monday’s bout, but he also put his team on the power play, with officials assessing Wilson an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty in addition to the matching fighting majors. Philadelphia’s Simon Benoit took a delay of game call eight seconds later, and Aliaksei Protas scored on the ensuing five-on-three to tie the game.
After playing against the Boston Bruins on Sunday night, Monday marked McIlrath’s final game of the preseason. As a veteran with over 100 NHL games played, he is only eligible to play in two of four exhibition games under the league’s renewed CBA rules.
