Washington Capitals Will Control Their Own Destiny

After the Washington Capitals close out the regular season in a home match up against the Anaheim Ducks on April 10, all bets will be off.

Following the most successful regular season in franchise history, one that has awarded the Caps their second ever Presidents’ Trophy and thus, home ice advantage through the 2016 Stanley Cup Playoffs, Washington will need exactly 16 more wins to validate their season.

I’ll get this out of the way now – and this is something that has been preached in recent weeks by the more level-headed fans of the Washington Capitals – it is completely okay to appreciate and even celebrate the success of this year’s regular season.

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For a while, it looked like the Caps might challenge the 1995-96 Detroit Red Wings who compiled a whopping 131 standings points. An ongoing slump has made that unrealistic, but the fact that it was a possibility for much of the season is something worth talking about.

However, this team, fanbase, and city in general is tired of the success being limited to the regular season. This year, and perhaps next as well, will be defining seasons for this organization because they likely present the best opportunities ever for the club to bring home their first Stanley Cup.

At the end of the day, if the Washington Capitals flame out in the first or second round once again, the season will likely be dubbed a failure. This is not an unfair assumption given the hype surrounding the team since a 24 hour span where the Caps added Justin Williams and T.J. Oshie to their lineup.

If there are any lingering memories of past failures, now is the time that the Washington Capitals will need to crush them.

On paper, there are few teams that can match up with this year’s Caps. Up and down the lineup, you will find players with the ability to score big goals in big moments.

The question is, will they?

There is ever increasing doubt that they can right now due to the aforementioned slump that has seemed to plague the team since a massive snowstorm hit the D.C. area in late January, forcing the rescheduling of two games and seemingly throwing the team off of its rhythm.

It was a common belief that the team would quickly turn it around. Injuries threw that prediction off, and now, with just half-a-dozen games remaining, some have begun panicking.

You can’t exactly blame them, because the same old story has been told time and time again. However, a common theme via both team and fanbase at times this year has been that this team is “just different.”

That is exactly right.