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Capitals Rumors

T.J. Oshie, Aliaksei Protas Could Return Tomorrow

March 23, 2024 at 8:15 pm CDT | by Brennan McClain Leave a Comment

  • In an update on two injured members of the Washington Capitals, Tom Gulitti of the NHL reports that the Capitals are hopeful that forwards T.J. Oshie (upper body) and Aliaksei Protas (lower body) will return to the lineup tomorrow against the Winnipeg Jets. As important members of the team’s top-six, and especially after the results of today’s matchups in the Eastern Conference, Washington will be well positioned moving forward to grab the last wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference.

    [SOURCE LINK]

Injury| Tampa Bay Lightning| Vegas Golden Knights| Washington Capitals Alex Pietrangelo| Aliaksei Protas| Haydn Fleury| T.J. Oshie

0 comments

Tom Wilson Suspended Six Games For High-Sticking

March 22, 2024 at 4:53 pm CDT | by Gabriel Foley 17 Comments

Washington Capitals winger Tom Wilson has received a six-game suspension for high-sticking Noah Gregor of the Toronto Maple Leafs, per Sammi Silber of The Hockey News. Wilson earned a double-minor penalty on the play, which saw him one-handed swing his stick across his body and into Gregor’s face. He was offered an in-person hearing, making him eligible for a suspension longer than five games.

This marks the sixth suspension of Wilson’s career, placing him in elite company among the NHL’s most-suspended players – a list led by Chris Pronger (seven suspensions) and Brad Marchand (eight suspensions). Wilson will have spent a combined 36 games suspended once he’s done with this absence – including his preseason suspension in 2017 and the reduction of his 20-game suspension in 2018 to 14 games. He will forfeit $161,458.32 in salary for high-sticking Gregor, per The Athletic’s Chris Johnston, bringing him to $1.563MM in salary forfeited to suspensions in his career. That’s $100,000 more than Marchand has spent in his path to the most-suspended player in league history.

Despite his long history of punishment, and the fact that he’s spent all 746 games of his career in one place, Wilson hasn’t yet earned the title of most-penalized Washington Capital. That instead belongs to the infamous Dale Hunter, who managed 2,003 penalty minutes in 872 games with the Capitals, in addition to 1,562 penalty minutes in 535 games with other teams. Fellow DOPS-favorite Scott Stevens also ranks ahead of Wilson in all-time penalty minutes, earning 1,628 in just 601 games with the Capitals. Both Hunter (2) and Stevens (14) rank in the top-15 of all-time penalty minutes.

Newsstand| Washington Capitals Tom Wilson

17 comments

Snapshots: Graves, St. Ivany, Krug, Oshie, Protas

March 22, 2024 at 3:47 pm CDT | by Gabriel Foley 1 Comment

The Pittsburgh Penguins have shared that defenseman Ryan Graves will be stepping away for a paternity leave, opening the door for rookie Jack St. Ivany to make his NHL debut. St. Ivany has flirted with his inaugural game for much of March, getting moved between the NHL and AHL four different times in the last week. He was clearly motivated by the string of moves, recording a career-high three-point night in his latest AHL game – his first since receiving the first NHL call-up of his career. The performance broke a 10-game scoring drought and accounted for a fifth of St. Ivany’s 15 points on the season. He’ll now have a golden chance to build on the hot night, potentially poised for a big role with Graves’ average of 19 minutes a night now up for grabs.

Other notes from around the league:

  • St. Louis Blues defenseman Torey Krug is expected to return to the lineup on Friday after sititng out with a chest injury on Thursday, per NHL.com’s Jessi Pierce. It was Krug’s first absence of the year, after appearing in the Blues’ first 69 games. He’s managed three goals and 34 points in those games. This is Krug’s first time playing in more than 65 games since the 2017-18 season.  His return is expected to bump Scott Perunovich back out of the lineup.
  • The Washington Capitals will continue to be without T.J. Oshie and Aliaksei Protas, head coach Spencer Carbery told The Hockey News. Both players sat out of the team’s Wednesday night loss against the Toronto Maple Leafs. Oshie is bearing with an upper-body injury, while Protas has a lingering lower-body injury suffered on March 9th. The team will eagerly anticipate their return, now left to lean on Michael Sgarbossa and Ivan Miroshnichenko as top-six fill-ins.

AHL| Injury| NHL| Pittsburgh Penguins| Players| Snapshots| Spencer Carbery| St. Louis Blues| Washington Capitals Aliaksei Protas| Ryan Graves| T.J. Oshie| Torey Krug

1 comment

Capitals Recall Matthew Phillips

March 22, 2024 at 9:34 am CDT | by Josh Erickson 1 Comment

The Capitals announced they’ve recalled right wing Matthew Phillips from AHL Hershey. He is expected to replace winger Tom Wilson in the lineup, who will miss Friday’s game and likely many more as he faces an in-person hearing with the Department of Player Safety today for a high-sticking incident in Wednesday’s 7-3 loss to the Maple Leafs.

The club had 14 forwards on their active roster before the injury. However, three of them – Wilson, T.J. Oshie (upper-body, day-to-day) and Aliaksei Protas (lower-body, day-to-day) – are unavailable or uncertain against the Hurricanes tonight.

Phillips, 25, began the season on an opening-night roster for the first time after inking a one-year, $775K deal with the Caps in free agency. One of the AHL’s most potent offensive threats over the past few seasons, the diminutive forward struggled to adapt to a full-time NHL role, posting only a goal and five points in 27 games and becoming a frequent healthy scratch after the New Year.

That led the Capitals to place him on waivers in mid-February, but he didn’t make it to the minors and was instead claimed by the Penguins. He had minimal impact with Washington’s longtime rival as well, going pointless in three games before serving as a healthy scratch in five straight and landing on waivers once again. Since the subsequent waiver placement was less than 30 days after the Caps lost him, Washington could reclaim and send him directly to AHL Hershey without exposing him to waivers, which they took advantage of.

Unsurprisingly, Phillips has looked like his old self on the best team in the AHL, recording three points and a +2 rating in four games since returning to the Capitals organization earlier this month. The 2016 sixth-round pick of the Flames has 240 points in 269 games since making his AHL debut with Stockton in 2017 and posted over a point-per-game in back-to-back seasons with the Flames’ primary affiliate before earning the one-way deal with Washington last summer.

Despite that level of production, Phillips never got much of a crack at the NHL level with Calgary, only skating in three games and averaging 10:48 with the Flames between 2020 and 2023. While he was a low-risk, high-reward signing for Washington, he was far from a proven commodity, and a lack of production and solid possession metrics in his extended chance earlier this season has likely ended the 5-foot-7 winger’s chances of cracking an NHL roster full-time.

He still carries value for organizations at the minor-league level as a premier talent to play with their top prospects on the farm, and there are certainly worse call-up options in a pinch to fill an offensively-inclined role. If head coach Spencer Carbery doesn’t want to shuffle his other lines, Phillips could directly replace Wilson’s spot on the second line alongside rookie Ivan Miroshnichenko and co-leading scorer Dylan Strome.

The Calgary native will be an RFA with arbitration rights this summer, although he’s a strong candidate to not receive a qualifying offer and reach the open market after reaching UFA status under Group 6 rules last summer.

Transactions| Washington Capitals Matthew Phillips

1 comment

Tom Wilson Offered In-Person Hearing For High-Sticking

March 21, 2024 at 6:46 pm CDT | by Josh Erickson 15 Comments

6:46 p.m.: Wilson’s in-person hearing will be held Friday afternoon, per the department, meaning we’ll get clarity soon on how long he’ll be out of the lineup.

12:05 p.m.: The NHL’s Department of Player Safety has offered Capitals winger Tom Wilson an in-person hearing after he high-sticked Maple Leafs forward Noah Gregor in last night’s 7-3 loss. The hearing date has not been announced, but the in-person option allows DoPS to suspend Wilson for six or more games.

Officials assessed Wilson a double minor penalty on the play, which occurred 12:15 into the third period. After engaging in a puck battle with Gregor along the boards, Wilson swung his stick one-handed, striking Gregor in the mouth (video link).

If suspended, it would be his sixth in the last seven years. Wilson, who made his NHL debut in 2013, was suspended on three separate instances in the 2017-18 season, one each in the preseason, regular season, and playoffs. All were less than five games. In the 2018 preseason, however, he was handed down a massive 20-game suspension by the league on a play that injured Blues forward Oskar Sundqvist, but it was later reduced to 14 by an independent arbitrator. His most recent suspension, a seven-gamer, came in March 2021. He’s also been fined five times.

After an injury-plagued 2022-23 campaign, Wilson has played in 66 of 68 games for the Caps this year. His 18:03 ATOI is second among current Caps forwards, while his 17 goals (4th) and 32 points (5th) are also near the top of the team leaderboard. A major minutes-muncher and still a truly impactful player, any long-term absence could significantly inhibit Washington’s chances at reaching the postseason. Their .551 points percentage is tied with the Red Wings for the last playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

Toronto Maple Leafs| Washington Capitals Noah Gregor| Player Safety| Tom Wilson

15 comments

T.J. Oshie, Aliaksei Protas Out With Injury

March 20, 2024 at 8:30 pm CDT | by Brennan McClain Leave a Comment

Before the puck drop in the team’s game tonight against the Toronto Maple Leafs, the Washington Capitals announced two injuries to their lineup. In the announcement, the Capitals stated that forward T.J. Oshie is out with an upper-body injury, and Aliaksei Protas is out with a lower-body injury.

Although both players were given a day-to-day injury designation, it is much of the same for Oshie this season. Oshie has only played in 43 of a possible 68 games for the Capitals this season, only managing 11 goals and 19 points in the process. With one more year remaining on his eight-year, $46MM contract after this year, the injury concern is certainly piling up for the veteran forward.

Protas, on the other hand, has sustained much more health than Oshie this season, skating in 65 games for Washington. Earning a five-year, $16.875MM contract extension in January, Protas has turned into quite the playmaker for the Capitals, scoring five goals and 28 points altogether.

[SOURCE LINK]

Injury| Loan| Minnesota Wild| Pittsburgh Penguins| Snapshots| Washington Capitals Aliaksei Protas| Jonas Brodin| Jonathan Gruden| T.J. Oshie

0 comments

Former Capital Chris Simon Passes Away At Age 52

March 19, 2024 at 3:13 pm CDT | by Gabriel Foley 9 Comments

Long-running NHL enforcer Chris Simon has passed away at age 52, per Daily Faceoff’s Frank Seravalli (Twitter link). Simon was a mainstay of the NHL’s bruiser era, playing 15 seasons in the NHL. Seven of those came with the Washington Capitals, where Simon remains one of the club’s most penalized players, with 666 penalty minutes in 320 games.

Simon was originally drafted 25th overall in the 1990 NHL Draft, going to the Philadelphia Flyers in what was then the second round. He was selected just ahead of 1000-game pros Doug Weight and Geoff Sanderson. But Philadelphia knew what they were getting in Simon, who recorded 36 goals, 74 points, and 146 penalty minutes in 57 OHL games during his draft year.

Two years after his draft day, Simon would be part of one of the biggest trades in NHL history – making up the ’future considerations’ aspect of the trade that sent Eric Lindros to the Philadelphia Flyers. Simon was moved to the Quebec Nordiques alongside Peter Forsberg, Ron Hextall, Steve Duchesne, $15MM in cash, and more.

The Nordiques awarded Simon with his NHL debut in the subsequent 1992-93 season, with Simon netting two points and 67 penalty minutes in just 16 NHL games. He’d go on to break the 100-penalty minutes mark in 1993-94, a feat he’d achieve in each of the next four seasons and pull off nine total times in his career. His most penalized year in the NHL came in 1995-96, when Simon totaled 250 penalty minutes in 64 games, the sixth-most in Nordiques/Colorado Avalanche history. Simon was also a major piece of Colorado’s 1996 Stanley Cup win, providing a physical presence and grit that pushed the Avalanche down the stretch.

Simon built a legacy as a hard-nosed enforcer, with 101 fighting majors across his 15-year career. PHR sends its condolences to Simon’s family and friends, as well as to all of the organizations he’s played for.

NHL| Philadelphia Flyers| Players| Washington Capitals Chris Simon

9 comments

Capitals Can Move Into Playoff Position Tuesday

March 18, 2024 at 9:10 am CDT | by Josh Erickson 3 Comments

  • The Eastern Conference wild-card race is heating up like a game of hot potato. The two leading contenders for the final playoff spot, the Islanders and Red Wings, are both on significant skids. The Isles have lost four straight, and the Red Wings have only won two out of their last 10. That’s paved the way for the Capitals to take advantage despite their remarkable -30 goal differential. With a point against the Flames on Monday on a two-game slate, they can move into the second wild-card spot in earnest, surpassing the Red Wings. They’ve already moved into the spot based on points percentage, as they trail Detroit by one point with two games in hand entering Monday night’s action.

Anaheim Ducks| New York Rangers| Washington Capitals Matt Rempe

3 comments

T.J. Oshie Game-Time Decision Due To Upper-Body Injury

March 16, 2024 at 5:01 pm CDT | by Josh Erickson Leave a Comment

  • Capitals veteran T.J. Oshie’s 1,000th game in the league may be on hold. The 37-year-old sustained an upper-body injury in practice on Saturday morning and will be a game-time decision tonight against the Canucks, head coach Spencer Carbery said (via Bailey Johnson of The Washington Post). The 2018 Stanley Cup champion has been plagued by injuries this season, missing 24 of Washington’s 65 games with lower and upper-body injuries. When in the lineup, they’ve dragged down his ability to contribute on the scoresheet. His 11 goals and 19 points in 41 games work out to 0.46 points per game, the lowest rate of his remarkably consistent 16-year career. Possession control has been an issue this season as well – his 46.4 CF% at even strength is also a career-low. Despite that, he’s still logging consistent top-six usage, averaging 16:33 per game.

Carolina Hurricanes| Injury| Tampa Bay Lightning| Washington Capitals T.J. Oshie| Tanner Jeannot| Teuvo Teravainen

0 comments

Red Wings And Capitals Have Decisions Looming On Key Youngsters

March 16, 2024 at 1:53 pm CDT | by Brian La Rose 3 Comments

Generally speaking, most of the notable contractual elements that could come into play for key prospects occur at the beginning of the season.  However, that isn’t the case for the Red Wings and Capitals who are facing decisions on a pair of promising wingers.  For Detroit, Jonatan Berggren is one game away from becoming waiver-eligible while for Washington, Ivan Miroshnichenko is one game away from officially activating the first year of his entry-level contract.

Berggren was a regular for Detroit last season and fared pretty well, picking up 15 goals and 13 assists in 37 games while playing in their middle six.  However, GM Steve Yzerman opted to make several additions up front over the summer, pushing the 23-year-old to the outside looking in at a regular spot in the lineup.

Instead of keeping him as a spare forward, the Red Wings decided to send Berggren to AHL Grand Rapids and kept him there for most of the season.  Through 43 games with the Griffins, he has done quite well, scoring 19 goals while adding 47 assists.  That has earned Berggren a brief stint with the big club where he has been productive in limited action, notching two goals and four helpers in a dozen games despite averaging less than 11 minutes a night.

Berggren was papered to Grand Rapids at the trade deadline and subsequently recalled, permitting him to return to the Griffins.  The only way they can do that is by not playing him in another game with Detroit.  Grand Rapids is well-positioned to make the playoffs this season so there’s a case to make that his development would be best served by a long postseason run with them over being on the fringes of the NHL lineup while the Red Wings are trying to hold onto the last Wild Card spot in the East.

Detroit elected to punt on the decision for today as they scratched Berggren against Buffalo but they will have to make a call on either playing him and keeping him up for the rest of the season or sending him down for the rest of the year.

As for Miroshnichenko, he has played in nine games for the Capitals so far this season and as a junior-aged player, the ten-game mark is critical as he would officially burn the first year of his contract.  If he doesn’t, the year would slide and he would still have three seasons left on that deal – at a slightly lower cap hit – heading into 2024-25.

The 20-year-old is in his first season in North America after spending his post-draft campaign split between Russia’s junior league and two professional leagues after recovering from cancer.  The bulk of that campaign was spent in the KHL with Avangard Omsk who agreed to terminate his deal after the season ended, allowing him to join Washington’s system.

Miroshnichenko has spent the majority of this season with AHL Hershey and has done relatively well, collecting nine goals and 16 assists through 47 games so far.  That has earned him a handful of recalls, the most recent of which came nearly three weeks ago.  Miroshnichenko has been a regular the last couple of weeks, getting him to that nine-game mark where he has two goals while averaging nearly 12 minutes a night.

Washington will soon need to decide if their playoff push (they sit one point out of the last Wild Card spot heading into today) is best aided with Miroshnichenko in the lineup or if they should be taking the longer view and sending him back down to get the extra cheap year on his contract.  Either way, unlike Berggren, Miroshnichenko will be able to return to Hershey whether it’s in the coming days or at the end of their season as he’ll remain waiver-exempt either way.  Set to play Vancouver later today, Washington will have to make the decision soon unless they want to push the decision back a couple of days by making him a healthy scratch.

It’s not often that decisions like this come up this late in a season but for Detroit and Washington, they’ll have to make a call on their youngsters in the near future.

Detroit Red Wings| Washington Capitals Ivan Miroshnichenko| Jonatan Berggren

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