Washington Capitals: Top 3 players they could lose in NHL Expansion Draft

Who could the Washington Capitals lose in the expansion draft?

At the end of this upcoming season, the NHL will welcome it’s 32nd franchise. The Seattle Kraken are scouting this upcoming season to see which players they could steal from the other 31 teams. What would this mean for the Washington Capitals?

Before we get to who the Caps could lose, let’s look at the rules as well as who they could protect in the draft. The rules state that teams can protect seven forwards, three defensemen, and one goalie or eight skaters and one goalie.

Players that have no movement clauses are required to be protected unless that player agrees to waive it. First and second year NHL players as well as unsigned draft choices are exempt from selection.

Teams have to make available a defenseman and two forwards who are under contract in 2021-22 and played at least 40 games the last season or 70 combined games between the previous two seasons. They also have to expose one goaltender.

Here’s my protected list: Alex Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom, Evgeny Kuznetsov, Tom Wilson, Jakub Vrana, Lars Eller, Carl Hagelin, John Carlson, Dmitry Orlov, Brenden Dillon, and Ilya Samsonov.

Given what I went with, here are the top 3 exposed players that could get selected.