When the Washington Capitals hit the ice on Saturday, they’ll reunite with a familiar face in a brand-new color.
John Carlson, now with the Tampa Bay Lightning, will face the Capitals for the first time in his NHL career, lining up against his former team after it dealt him at the trade deadline this spring.
Over his 17 seasons in DC, Carlson became a cornerstone of the Capitals franchise, with a longer tenure than anyone except for captain Alex Ovechkin. He leads all Capitals defensemen in career goals (166), assists (605), points (771), and games played (1,143), all but destined to see his number raised to the rafters.
Even more than six months after the trade, Carlson’s former teammates knew it’d be strange seeing him in another jersey. His absence continued to loom large as the team started the 2026-27 season, especially for Ovechkin and Tom Wilson, the only two players remaining from the 2018 championship roster.
“I think [facing Carlson will] be really weird,” Tom Wilson said on Monday. “We didn’t see him last year. It feels weird, obviously, not having him around. He’s been (in) one place for 17 years, and it’s kind of all we know here.
“O was looking at me at dinner last night. He’s like, ‘We’re the only ones left.’”
Ovechkin, who called the trade the “toughest” day of his career personally, mirrored Wilson’s sentiment. “It will be weird,” he said of playing against Carlson. “Obviously I miss him a lot, but nothing we can do.”
Carlson, too, said much the same.
“I think it’ll be weird,” he told NHL.com’s Tom Gulitti. “Obviously, as soon as the schedule came out, it didn’t take long to see it. I don’t know. We’ll see what happens, but I think, at a minimum, it’ll be a little bit weird here.”
Carlson left DC in a late-night bombshell trade, sent across the country to the Anaheim Ducks for a first- and third-round draft pick. He recorded 14 points (4g, 10a) in 16 regular-season Ducks games — plus six assists in 12 playoff games — before signing a two-year, $17 million deal with the Bolts as an unrestricted free agent.
Before the season started, Carlson’s wife Gina, herself a Maryland native, drew ire from some Capitals fans for posting Carlson’s headshot with the caption “I never liked red anyway 🫶🏻” to her Instagram Story, later criticizing the profane responses she received.
“Do I wish things ended better with an organization my husband spent 17 years with? Yes. I do. It broke me that it didn’t. He did not simply just get traded. There was much more to it,” she wrote.
Capitals goaltender Logan Thompson didn’t reference the post directly when asked about facing Carlson, but he slyly indicated that he disagreed with Gina Carlson’s preference for blue.
“Personally, I like him better in red,” Thompson quipped. “I think it looks better. But yeah, it’s going to be tough. He was a good guy to me, a good teammate, a good friend. He meant so much to this city, so he’s going to come out hard, and I know our guys are going to be excited to see them, but at the end of the day, it’s a game against Tampa, and that’s going to be our main focus.”
Asked whether playing Carlson would boost the Capitals’ determination, head coach Spencer Carbery told reporters he was more concerned about Carlson’s ability to motivate his new team.
“I’m more concerned about John getting his 19 teammates fired up for that game, maybe even another level,” he said. “But, I mean, yeah, we know Tampa. We know John. John just adds to what their group already — the issues that that group already causes you, and then, you’re going into their home opener, and it’s a difficult building to play in.”
“I know he’s not going to take it easy on us, and we won’t take it easy on him,” said Wilson.
Washington’s schedule won’t allow for a drawn-out reunion. After playing the first half of their back-to-back in Raleigh on Friday, the Capitals arrived in Tampa after midnight on Saturday, and will stay for less than 24 hours before returning to DC. Even so, players planned to make sure they had time to visit with their longtime brother in arms.
“I’m sure we’ll see each other at some point, whether it’s after the game or before the game or whatever it may be,” Dylan Strome said on Wednesday. “I’m sure we’ll stop in and say hello and ask how things are going. He’s one of my closest friends. So we’ve been talking throughout camp and throughout the summer. It’s going to be odd, for sure, but I think we’re both excited for the fact to battle against each other.”
And even though Carlson’s time in Washington has come to an end, his impact on the locker room is far from gone. He spent close to two decades with the team, including seven years as an alternate captain, shaping a generation of Capitals players who now follow in his footsteps.
“There’s been so many good people that have come through this organization,” Wilson said. “John was one of those people, and what he did for the culture in the room, it lives on. He invested a ton of pride and blood, sweat, and tears in this team, and we still feel it. We still have a lot of lessons that we learned from him.
“It’ll be weird to play against him, but I think there will be some laughs, some smiles. But he’s a competitive guy, so he’s definitely not going to take it easy on us.”
