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The Washington Capitals’ disappointing 2022-23 season resulted in an organizational admission that, while the team still eyes a run at a second Stanley Cup championship in the waning seasons of Alex Ovechkin’s playing career, the need for an infusion of youth was necessary going forward.
So it was perhaps no accident that when the team selected Right Wing Ryan Leonard in the first-round of the 2023 NHL Entry Draft, the selection came with the eighth overall pick, signifying an anecdotal point in Washington’s nearly 50-year history.
On Thursday, the club added more young players to their prospect pool, with Rounds 2-7 of the 2023 draft.
Capitals Select Andrew Cristall In The Second Round Of The 2023 NHL Entry Draft
The Capitals are still very much a veteran-led team, with the likes Ovechkin (in pursuit of a once-seemingly unbreakable record), Nicklas Backstrom, T.J. Oshie, John Carlson, Evgeny Kuznetsov and Tom Wilson the remaining members of the Stanley Cup-winning roster of five summers ago. And while a full-on rebuild is out of the equation as long as The Great Eight is still firing one-timers from his office, the team’s movement towards a younger lineup has been promising.
After mutually parting ways with veteran Head Coach Peter Laviolette at the conclusion of the season, the Caps hired Spencer Carbery, a longtime farmhand who became the first coach in franchise history to serve as Head Coach at all three professional levels of the organization (Carbery previously served as the bench boss for the AHL’s Hershey Bears, as well as the ECHL’s South Carolina Stingrays).
Carbery, who at 41-years old is the first bench boss in franchise history to be born after the club’s inaugural 1974-75 season, signifies a step toward the future while maintaining the balance with the club’s veteran talent. With his history coaching a number of the team’s top prospects in the AHL with Hershey, Carbery is well-equipped to handle the task at hand.
“Not only have they lived, they played it”, Carbery said about the veteran leadership group during his introductory press conference, “But they’re champions, they’ve won a Stanley Cup here. Their opinions, what they see it’s important…I would attach that to the development part as well.”
“It’s our job as a coaching staff to come in and help these young players get caught up to speed as quickly as possible, it’s also the responsibility of our leadership group. They have a big part in ‘how can we get these young players ready to play and playing in a winning culture’, and that’s what I will specifically lean on our leadership group, and challenge them to do a good job in that department.”
While the looming shadow of free agency and the potential deals General Manager Brian MacLellan may make have yet to come to light, the Capitals’ step toward an infusion of young players now and down the road has been nothing short of promising.
By Michael Fleetwood