ARLINGTON, Va. — The Washington Capitals have won five-straight for the first time this season. The five wins have been gritty, greasy, or whatever term you want to use, but in the end, the Caps have found ways to win.
While anyone can pinpoint the penalty kill being lights out, or the young guns stepping up, one man deserves a lot of credit establishing the “never give up” mentality, and the buy-in from the locker room.
Capitals head coach Spencer Carbery is a primary reason why the Caps are playing terrific hockey. He is pushing all the right buttons and getting the best out of his players during this recent stretch.
“He’s a great communicator. We’ve had a lot of meetings throughout the whole season on just what we expect from each other, what we expect from him and what he expects from us,” John Carlson told NoVaCaps. “I think just being an open book allows a lot of good things to happen within and we know what type of team we need to be, and we know how this team needs to play to have success.”
Wednesday’s tilt with the Buffalo Sabres proved how powerful his passion and energy can be. Washington was down 2-0 and then eventually 3-2, but the Caps did not hang their heads like in years prior and instead turned up the pace and eventually got rewarded with a late goal in the third period to force overtime. Then they won the game with seven seconds left in overtime.
“I think the never give up mentality is the fact that we’re always in every game and we’re feeling good about our game, and we feel comfortable,” Dylan Strome told NoVaCaps. “He’s done a good job of letting us know that we’re never out of games and I think that’s just the mindset we’ve had ever since that Montreal game when we came back from down 2-0 in the third [period].”
When he was hired by the organization over the summer, the 42-year-old bench boss was labeled as a passionate and energetic individual. Throughout his years in the Capitals’ farm system, with the South Carolina Stingrays and the Hershey Bears respectively, he has continued to build on that energy, but he had to tinker with his coaching tactics.
Caps defenseman Lucas Johansen played under Carbery for two seasons with Hershey. When they worked together back in the 2018-19 and 2019-20 seasons, Johansen says that his system was not always about playing with the puck. But his personality never changed.
“In terms of his work ethic and his commitment to running the team, that’s definitely the same. I think that’s probably one of the reasons he got hired and why he climbed the ranks so fast,” Johansen said. “I think he’s definitely shifted more to possession and [being] offensive minded as well as [being] defensively minded. It seems like he picked that up when he was with the [Toronto Maple Leafs], so it really complimented his philosophy of the game and right now it’s working pretty well for us.”
There was always going to be a learning curve with the brand new, puck possessive system. While it did take longer than the team had hoped, the important thing is that they are buying into what Carbery says. The players want to play for him and win for him.
“There can be an adjustment period and you want to learn the system and [Carbery] brings an energy and passion and we want to execute that game plan as much as we can. I think we’re starting to figure it out,” Tom Wilson said after Wednesday’s win against Buffalo.
Now, this is not to say that Peter Laviolette could not motivate the team or communicate with his players during his three-year tenure in D.C. He was known to be a terrific motivator and to hold his players accountable, but he dealt with difficult circumstances with injuries.
However, there was a lack of identity under Laviolette and a lack of will. The Capitals would fold very easily when trailing in games, and that has not been the case this year under Carbery.
“He’s just an honest guy that knows exactly how he feels about every situation, and he doesn’t sugarcoat it,” Carlson said. “Whether things are going good or bad, he’s got his set ideals and what he thinks is the group and the standard and he’s gonna hold us to that. Whether we’re winning 5-0 or losing 6-2, those are things that we build within each other as a group of players, but the coaching staff has a lot to do with it too.”
The Capitals will look to continue to ride the momentum from Wednesday’s win when they take on the Edmonton Oilers for a Black Friday showdown.
By Jacob Cheris