The Washington Capitals touched the ice at Capital One Arena for the first time this preseason on Thursday night. As the heated training camp position battles continue, head coach Spencer Carbery got further looks at many of the names on the fringe of the team’s roster, with several hard decisions to come in the next few days.
Ryan Leonard opened the scoring with his second of the preseason, punching home a Jakob Chychrun rebound. Riley Tufte, Brett Harrison, and Patrick Brown scored three unanswered to hand the Capitals their first loss of the preseason.
Observations
- Ryan Leonard scored a goal that he will probably score hundreds of during his NHL career, getting inside position in front of the net to pounce on a loose puck in the crease. He also made a few noticeable defensive plays early on that will surely make his bench boss happy. Leonard feels assured to start the season somewhere in the team’s middle six.
- The young core of talent in the Capitals’ organization right now is just absurd. In this game alone, we got to watch Leonard, Ivan Miroshnichenko, Ilya Protas, Andrew Cristall, Hendrix Lapierre, Eriks Mateiko, Vincent Iorio, and Ryan Chesley all in the same game. That’s three first-round picks, three second-round picks, and two third-round picks. As Ian pointed out, the Capitals haven’t even added Cole Hutson to the group yet.
- Alex Ovechkin made his preseason debut and seemingly decided to save all of his shots for when the games count. He passed on several good opportunities, creating great chances for his linemates. Overall, Ovi finished with 21:07 of ice time, one shot on goal, and three hits.
- We got to see Martin Fehervary in game action for the first time since last April. Fehervary threw a few big hits, recording a team-high five overall, and skated 19:40 in the loss. He was on the ice for all three Bruins goals.
- Preseason game and all, but I thought the referees were horrible, and I rarely comment on officiating in recaps or morning numbers posts. Kelly Sutherland, in particular, just refused to do his job for the entire second period. The Bruins get their second goal after he lets them off the hook on two holds right before, and the Capitals’ defensemen couldn’t get a line change. They were also just in the way of several clearing attempts on both sides of the rink.
- Charlie Lindgren was incredibly leaky on both goals against. The first was just a straight-up gaffe he’ll want to put in the same folder as his own goal against the Tampa Bay Lightning last year.
The Capitals will be back at MedStar Capitals Iceplex for a regular day of practice on Friday, before their preseason finale against the Columbus Blue Jackets on Saturday night. The team needs to have a final 23-man roster decided by October 7 at 5 pm, a day before they open their regular season at home against the Bruins.
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