Jan. 23 vs. Calgary Flames at Scotiabank Saddledome
Time: 9:00 p.m.
TV: MNMT
Radio: 106.7 THE FAN/Caps Radio Network
Washington Capitals (24-21-6)
Calgary Flames (21-24-5)
Washington’s six-game road excursion takes it next to Alberta for the middle two matches of the tour. Those contests will be played as part of a weekend set of back-to-backs on Friday night in Calgary and Saturday in Edmonton.
As it comes to Calgary to finish off the front half of the trip, Washington finds itself in both unfamiliar and familiar territory. The Caps are in unfamiliar territory because they’ve dropped four straight games in regulation for the first time in the three seasons in which Spencer Carbery has been at the coaching helm, and they’re in familiar territory because as currently constituted, they more closely resemble the team they were in 2023-24 – two seasons ago – than the one that won the Eastern Conference crown with 111 points last season.
Two seasons ago, the Caps were mired in mediocrity in the post-holiday break portion of the schedule; it took a late surge for them to sneak into the second wild card berth of the Stanley Cup playoffs, a slot they secured in the waning minutes of their final regular season game. Washington needed just 91 points to nose its way into the postseason in ’23-24.
Through 51 games, this year’s model is on pace for just 87 points, which won’t be nearly enough to get into the top eight in the Eastern Conference. The Boston Bruins, current occupants of the second wild card slot in the East, are on pace for 95 points. And the group of teams between the Caps and that eighth spot keeps growing, too. There are now three of them.
Not long ago, the Caps looked like a team that could make a surge up the standings if they could shore up their sagging special teams play. They’ve done so recently, only to see their 5-on-5 play – the team’s foundation through most of the first half of the season – start listing noticeably at both ends of the ice, and at the worst time.
In its most recent loss, the second 4-3 setback they’ve suffered at the hands of the League’s worst team to this point of the season – the Vancouver Canucks – Washington jumped out to an early 2-0 lead when it cashed in on both ends of a 5-on-3 manpower advantage early in the first period. Later in the game, the Caps successfully stifled a Canucks two-man advantage of 74 seconds in duration.
But Vancouver victimized them for three goals against at 5-on-5 – all on plays originating below the Washington goal line, a recurring problem plaguing the Caps of late – and the Canucks notched the game-winner midway through the second period while the two teams were skating at 4-on-4.
“Special teams was great tonight,” said Carbery in the aftermath of Wednesday’s defeat. “They get us on the board early. Our 5-on-5, we got outscored what was it tonight? [3-0]. Yeah, so, they get one on 4-on-4; we get one 6-on-5. So, yeah, we need to do a better job 5-on-5 and not getting outscored. Do I think it's a problem over the last little bit? Maybe a little bit, but I think that's just our overall game. I wouldn't point to anything at 5-on-5 structurally.
“I think there's a lot of things going on. We're just making too many blunders that we can't cover up for. And that's the other part of this too, is we're just going to have to tighten up. I think what we're going back to is this is not the team from last year. It's just not, and so if we keep thinking that we are and keep banging our heads against the wall and coming up short and go, ‘Why aren't we the team from last year? What's going on? What happened?’ instead of realizing, ‘Listen, we might have to go back to [being] a team [from] two years ago that just checked and just didn't give teams anything, and was totally comfortable in a 1-0 game, and felt good about that, and wanted to do that.’
“And so that's what we're working with our group on, is there's nothing wrong with winning the game 2-1, and giving up 10 chances and it being a little bit ugly and a little bit of a fight in the mud.”
For the Canucks, Wednesday’s win was their first in calendar 2026, and it halted the longest losing skid in franchise history, 11 games (0-9-2).
Washington’s analytics from Wednesday’s loss were better than many recent outings. They outdid Vancouver in most facets of the numbers, but the bottom line was that Vancouver didn’t have to work as hard to accomplish as much in the offensive zone.
Despite outdoing the Canucks in expected goals at (3.11 to 2.13) and in offensive zone possession time (6:26 to 3:47) at 5-on-5, the Caps were outscored 3-0.
The Canucks were opportunistic and created three of their four goals on the forecheck – with some aid from Washington miscues – while the Caps couldn’t generate as many threatening looks at the opposite end of the rink.
“First of all, we’ve got to defend better,” says Caps right wing Tom Wilson. “That has nothing to do with the legs or energy; we're just giving them too many odd man rushes. We're giving them too many times where we lose coverage and the guy is all alone on [goaltender Logan Thompson].
“So, I think we're going to have to look ourselves in the mirror, defend a little bit better. And then from there, we'll worry about the offensive end once we get there, but [we’re] just giving up too much. And if we're going to be giving that up, you better be getting a lot at the other end. So, we'll start in our own end and build from there, and then hopefully we can transition to better offense.”
Mistakes are also crushing the Caps of late, as Carbery noted before Monday’s game in Colorado and again after Wednesday’s game in Vancouver.
“We’ve talked about it ad nauseum,” says Caps defenseman John Carlson, who notched career assist No. 599 on Washington’s first goal Wednesday. “I think we address it. There’s no hiding in here; we know where our game is at and what we need to expect from each other. So, talking about it, and you’ve got to execute. The name of the game is execution, whether it’s making the right plays to get out of the zone, or making the right plays in the [offensive] zone to get a scoring chance, or – when you do get a scoring chance – to bear down and score. We need to just gather more of those key moments of each game, and we’ve got to learn pretty quick.”
That’s for sure. The math gets more difficult with each loss. The Caps are now one of five teams in the NHL with 51 games played, the most in the League to this point. They’ve got less runway with which to make up more ground than most of the other teams they’re competing against for playoff berths.
Three of the other teams with 51 games under their belts – Detroit, Minnesota and Edmonton – are fairly firm in their current standings position and are likely to make the playoffs. Aside from the Caps, the other team is the New York Rangers, who recently crafted another statement relating to yet another sea change in their organizational direction.
That’s not the kind of company the Caps want to be keeping.
Recently, the Caps have encountered some “angry” opposition. On Jan. 7 at home, they caught the Dallas Stars a night after they absorbed a 6-3 thumping at the hands of the Hurricanes in Carolina. The Stars then downed the Caps, 4-1.
Less than two weeks later, the Florida Panthers came into Washington a night after being humiliated by the Hurricanes, 9-1. The Panthers beat the Caps 5-2 on the back half of that back-to-back.
At the outset of this road trip, the Caps clashed with the Avalanche in Colorado, the game after the Avs were humbled by Nashville 7-3 in Denver, ending the Avs’ 22-game home point streak (19-0-3 ) to start the season. The Avs prevailed over the Caps, 5-2.
Ahead of Wednesday’s game in Vancouver, Carbery noted how the Caps keep running into these “angry” teams, coming off bad beats or reckoning games. With only 31 games now remaining on their schedule, it feels like it’s more than time for the Caps to now become that “angry” team themselves.
“If there is ever a time where our urgency level [needs to climb],” begins Carbery, “our season is hanging in the balance and that’s just a fact. I’m not sugar-coating it, and I’m not trying to over-emphasize where we’re at in the Eastern Conference and what’s coming at the [NHL trade] deadline, and the break, and how quickly the deadline comes after the break.
“You name it, everything is pointing to the fact that our season is hanging in the balance and that’s where we’re going to have to dig in and give everything we possibly have and play like we’re in the Stanley Cup playoffs. I hate using that in the regular season, and you never want to drum that up in January and say, ‘It’s like a playoff game.’ But we are getting very, very close to teetering on if we don’t get results soon here, we are going to be in a huge, huge hole.”
