Washington Capitals News: Spencer Carbery emerges as head coaching candidate, big decision looming for Nicklas Backstrom

Welcome to a new feature we’ll do throughout the offseason as a stick tap to all the good people covering the Washington Capitals. We’ll scour the internet and look for some popular trending Caps topics and give our take as well as link to the source so you can check it out for yourself.

As the hockey world awaits who is the next team to be awarded the next Stanley Cup, we now know who the final four field is. It ain’t the Caps, it’s business over here at MedStar as the team tries to figure out who the next head coach is.

LeBrun: Capitals Have Sought Permission From Maple Leafs To Interview Spencer Carbery, Have Already Interviewed Other Candidates

(Jon Sorensen/NoVa Caps)

It’s no secret that general manager Brian MacLellan has to get this next head coaching hire right and he has already did his homework and his research on who the best candidate would be that would handle the vets and inspire the kids.

This was reported by The Athletic’s Pierre Lebrun that the Caps reached out to the Toronto Maple Leafs to talk to assistant coach Spencer Carbery. He’s had success in Hershey. Can he bring it to D.C.?

What Will Capitals Do With Backstrom? Team Faces Tough Decision As He Remains Adamant About Continuing Career

(Sammi Silber/The Hockey News)

Obviously the mindset of a player compared to a GM is different. If you remember on breakdown day, a confident Nicklas Backstrom was excited about training for next season. GMBM basically said to pump the brakes when he said that the longtime center has to make a decision about his career.

Backstrom should honestly pray about it, whatever he believes, meditate, and then hit the gym hard. Then decide. But either way, it’s not an easy decision at all.

Before we get to the last story we interrupt you with Alex Ovechkin having fun in some kiddie cars.

https://twitter.com/HockeyNewsHub/status/1658222721476571137

Capitals fan survey: Should they trade Evgeny Kuznetsov? Who will they pick in the draft?

(Tarik El-Bashir/The Athletic subscription required)

It goes without saying that Evgeny Kuznetsov had a down season. But what did Caps fans have to say? El-Bashir polled the people to find out. there was some interesting points that fans came to a consensus on.

For starters, there are 25.8 percent of fans that are cautiously optimistic about the future (me included) while 24.3 percent are in the “Hey, we’ll always have 2018!” mindset. 57.6 percent believe that injuries to key players was a factor in the team missing the playoffs.

Out of respect for my good friend Tarik I won’t reveal the rest and I’ll leave the Kuzy trade opinion consensus to you to find out.