Washington Capitals: 2 Preseason Storylines Worth Watching
Mandatory Credit: Greg M. Cooper-USA TODAY Sports
The Washington Capitals pre-season efforts are officially underway after 2 of their 7 scheduled games are now in the books.
Washington Capitals hockey is finally here! Well, it may be exhibition hockey, but it doesn’t dampen that familiar thrill of seeing the guys light the lamp in China Town and abroad. Pre-season gives us all a first glimpse at lots of unfolding storylines with the Washington Capitals for 2015-2016, so let’s sift through a few and set our sights on Thursday’s matchup with the Montreal Canadiens.
More from Capitals News
- Breaking down the Rookie Camp roster
- Hear what Magic Johnson said about Alex Ovechkin
- Capitals announce Rookie Camp schedule
- Breaking down the 2023-24 Capitals national TV schedule
- Capitals Alumni Weekend is coming back
MORE FROM STARS AND STICKS: NHL Power Rankings
1. Jay Beagle considers third center role a “Dream Job”
During an interview Monday night with John Walton of Caps Radio, Jay Beagle was asked about his future involvement with the team; in light of his new 3-year $1,750,000 per season contract. Beagle made his intentions clear: he described the third line center role as a “dream job” and wants to inherit it for the 2015-2016 season. Jay detailed his off-season training regimen in Calgary with a heavy emphasis on skating. He has already reportedly been praised by the coaching staff for looking at ease in advanced skating drills with the Washington Capitals in practice.
After confirming how reassuring it was to have his contract negotiations completed with the team, Beagle went on to emphasize that his aim this season is to become a permanent fixture in the Washington Capitals roster as the team’s third-line center. It’s clear that Beagle wants more ice time to prove his responsible 2-wayvalue, but concedes that the 3rd line is likely as high as he’ll go, barring further injuries to the center corps.
Beagle hopes to earn the Washington Capitals third line center role. Mandatory Credit: Bill Streicher-USA TODAY Sports
He may have already captured Trotz and MacLellan’s confidence since his strong face-off performances during the postseason bout with the New York Islanders. We saw Barry Trotz repeatedly call Beagle’s number during defensive zone faceoffs late in games while defending a lead in that series.
Beagle will have Brooks Laich as his primary competition for the 3C spot, although after Derek Roy showed some quick chemistry with Riley Barber in the Monday matchup with the Canes; so they both may need to watch out.
2. Back-up Goalie Battle!
When the Washington Capitals signed goaltender Dan Ellis over the summer, most of us kind of presumed he had been penciled in to fill the goalie gap left by Pheonix Copley’s departure from the Hershey Bears. It seems Dan Ellis did not get that memo. He looks ready to compete for the Washington Capitals backup job.
After making several spectacular saves Monday night on the Carolina Hurricanes (who led the Washington Capitals in shots for much of the second period), Ellis looks to have set the bar pretty high for Philipp Grubauer who is also vying for the #2 spot. Making a few back-to-back kick saves in heavy traffic and ending the night with a joint shut-out with Braden Holtby (who played the 1st period), Ellis might be trying to assert his value as a stable, veteran presence in net. He may have helped to do so in his performance last night. We’ll all want to watch his starts during the rest of the season.
Philip Grubauer looked to be a shoe-in for the Washington Capitals backup job, especially after his strong performance in Game 2 of the playoff series against the Islanders. Grubauer has arguably “earned” the strongest consideration for the backup spot after the performance and the mediocre regular season play of backstop Justin Peters (12 games played, .881 SV%, 3.25 GAA).
Grubauer looked strong in net last night against the Bruins, although eventually giving up the game-winning goal 12 seconds into the 3-on-3 overtime. It’s a tough spot to be put in for goaltenders, but the chance to shine was definitely there. That’s hardly a criticism on the rest of his game though as the team generally looked to be lacking cohesiveness in front of him. That’s to be expected with the jumbled up lines in pre-season.
Ellis is not ready to concede the backup goalie role to Grubauer. Mandatory Credit: Geoff Burke-USA TODAY Sports
As a bonus, it should also be noted that Tom Wilson and a couple of the prospect youngsters (Riley Barber, Jakub Vrana) looked impressive thus far. Wilson will play on the third line this year, and Mike Vogel has intimated during previous broadcasts, that he may even crack the top six this year. Tom would have to make quite an impression to warrant a spot above the third line, in my opinion, so I certainly hope that he does exactly that. Potting the first goal of the pre-season certainly isn’t a bad way to begin.
We got to see some shakeups in the defensive end of the roster as well, where Aaron Ness worked on a pairing with Dmitry Orlov and Christian Djoos got to work with Matt Niskanen on Monday night. Tyler Lewington and Madison Bowey were heavily featured on Tuesday. I think Djoos and Bowey have put up strong enough efforts to warrant further starts in the pre-season, so another look at the Washington Capitals bottom pairing options may be in order.
We’ll keep an eye out on these emerging stories from Washington Capitals pre-season and see how they unfold on the road to the regular season!
Next: Michael Latta Injury Update