Aliaksei Protas

Hershey players who were coached by Spencer Carbery: ‘He always wants to win. It’s never enough for him.’

HERSHEY, PA — After leading the Toronto Maple Leafs’ power play to consecutive top two finishes in power-play percentage, Spencer Carbery emerged as the the top young coaching prospect available on the NHL market this summer, garnering interviews from the Washington Capitals, Anaheim Ducks, and New York Rangers.

Upon his hiring by the Capitals on May 30, Carbery became the first head coach in team history to lead all three levels of the same organization. Carbery served as head coach of the ECHL South Carolina Stingrays from 2011 through 2016 and was the bench boss of the AHL’s Hershey Bears for three seasons from 2018 through 2021.

With all those years in the Capitals organization, Carbery has coached around a dozen players who still remain in the system, including Connor McMichael, Martin Fehervary, Alex Alexeyev, and Joe Snively.

During his initial press conference with Capitals media, Carbery spoke about wanting to bring good communication to the organization. He also wanted to instill broader ides of “pace” and “connectivity” to the team.

But without being in the room or on the bench as a player, understanding Carbery’s value or top prospect status as a coach is more difficult to understand. So I asked two previously Carbery-coached players, Aliaksei Protas and Beck Malenstyn, to explain what it was like playing under him. There are qualities that Spencer has that become immediately clear when reading their answers.

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