Washington Capitals: Top 10 worst seasons in team history

#9 2013-14

This was a rare year where the Capitals missed the playoffs entirely in the Rock the Red era. It was the final year of the Adam Oates era and he was simply a bad coach. Was he worse than Todd Reirden? Maybe.

The Caps finished 38-30-14 with 90 points and a fifth place finish in the brand new Metropolitan Division. Alex Ovechkin had 51 goals that season so it wasn’t quite his fault. Joel Ward and Troy Brouwer also had good years with 24 and 25 goals, respectively.

The Caps lost all three of their games to the Pittsburgh Penguins that year. Anytime you get swept by the Penguins it’s a bad year. I don’t even think Oates got a single win against the Penguins during his time coaching the Caps.

Okay I looked, I was correct. Oates went 0-5 against the Penguins.

The Caps were decent at home that season with a respectable 21-13-7 record. But the road was what did them in as they went 17-17-7. Ouch.

What also did the Caps in that year was their atrocious defense. And it was bad from the get go. They allowed four or more goals in seven of their first 20 games.

The problem with the offense was after it got off to a hot start it cooled off. Even though Ovechkin had 51 goals he still had a plus minus of minus 35. They also relied way too much on the power play.