Washington Capitals Announce Phase 3 Return To Play Roster

The Washington Capitals have announced their roster for phase 3 of the NHL’s return to play plan.

Washington Capitals fans can breathe a slight sigh of relief as all the Caps from the regular season will join the team for the postseason. I say a slight sigh of relief because players still have until July 13th at 5pm EST to opt-out of joining the bubble at Hotel X in Toronto, Ontario. So it is still possible for one or some of the Caps to decide that, for whatever personal reasons, the will not be joining the team.

With that being said, let’s take a look at who will be joining the Capitals in their quest for a second Stanley Cup.

Forwards

As mentioned, all of the usual suspects are accounted for on this roster sheet. What’s most interesting is who the Capitals have decided to join the club as the “black aces” for their playoff run. In addition to their regular forward lineup, the Caps have elected to bring along Shane Gersich, Philippe Maillet, Beck Malenstyn, Connor McMichael, Garrett Pilon, Brian Pinho and Daniel Sprong.

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Of all these new names, I think the one Caps fans are most excited to potentially see gear up for a game would be 2019 first-round pick, Connor McMichael. McMichael lit the OHL on fire this season, posting 47 goals and 55 assists for 102 points in 52 games with the London Knights.

It will also be interesting to see if Shane Gersich returns to a playoff lineup, as he played in 2 postseason games for the Capitals in 2018 on their run to the Cup.

Defense

Again, all of the Caps top-7 d-men are on this roster, which is as expected. The new faces on the blue line include Alexander Alexeyev, Martin Fehervary, and Tyler Lewington.

A couple of these guys have seen ice with the Capitals, including Martin Fehervary who played 6 games with the big club this past season, and Tyler Lewington who has played 8 games for the Caps over the previous two seasons.

When it comes to exciting prospects on the back-end, Caps fans would be most excited about 2018 first-round pick, Alex Alexeyev, potentially gear up for his first NHL game. Of course, we would love to see these young players suit up, however we are more than fine with one of the current roster players not either getting injured, or playing abysmally to allow an opening in the lineup.

Goaltending

In terms of goaltending, this is pretty much what everybody should have expected. It is interesting to see that Braden Holtby has been given the net, however I believe it also the correct choice. Holtby is the experienced, playoff-tested netminder who deserves to control the crease to kick things off.

This is a very exciting time for hockey fans. Provided everything is done safely, and players and personnel are healthy, this will be the most outrageous postseason the NHL has ever seen. With the roster official, Capitals fans can officially get excited about hockey coming back. Now we count down the days until August – the new April of the hockey season.