UNIONDALE, N.Y. — Evgeny Kuznetsov downplayed his feat after the game, a flood of spotlights and a number of microphones stuck in his face, and even a day later, when his two goals were but a memory, his feelings remained a mystery.
“I have this questions every day,” Kuznetsov said on Friday, roughly a half hour after the Washington Capitals wrapped up practice at Nassau Coliseum. “I never talk about my game, but I feel much better when we got two points in the regular season or we win the playoff.”
Kuznetsov has long been a mystery himself, having finally joined the Capitals last spring after five seasons playing for HC Traktor, the KHL team in his Russian hometown of Chelyabinsk. He arrived four years after he was drafted, and the organization wasn’t sure what it was getting: His selection to his country’s junior national team spoke to his talent, but his performance was consistently undermined by injuries.
What has become abundantly clear now, especially late in Kuznetsov’s rookie season, is that he’s a player the Capitals can build around. Their second-line center for two thirds of the year, the 22-year-old Kuznetsov had a coming-out party on Thursday, scoring two goals and assisting on another in Washington’s 5-1 victory over the New York Islanders in Game 5 of the first-round playoff series between the two teams.
The victory means the Capitals can knock the Islanders out of the postseason and advance to the Eastern Conference semifinals with a victory on Saturday. For Kuznetsov, it also serves as a reassurance that the steps he’s taken in his first full season in Washington are paying off.
“He’s really improved his game,” coach Barry Trotz said. “He wants to be a really good player. I think you’re starting to scratch the surface of what he can be and hopefully, he’s going to have a really good, long career in this league.”
Kuznetsov was drafted in the first round in 2010, shortly after he concluded his first season in Russia’s top professional hockey league. In five years, he never tallied more than 44 points — but then again, he never played a full 60-game season, accounting for 19 goals and 25 assists in 51 games in 2012-13.
His 17-game trial run with the Capitals last spring wasn’t long enough to fully evaluate his abilities — he had three goals and six assists while playing roughly 13 minutes a game — and an overhaul of team personnel left his role in further doubt.
After Trotz was hired to replace Adam Oates as the team’s coach, his message to Kuznetsov was simple, yet affirmative. If Kuznetsov could be patient and trust in Trotz’s methods, his successes would follow.
Having parked Kuznetsov on the fourth line in the early part of the season, he grew increasingly reliable, moving into a second-line role between left wing Marcus Johansson and right wing Troy Brouwer by late November.
Gradually, he was trusted to play late into games, take defensive-zone draws and serve a role on the power play. After he had two goals and six assists in the first two months, he had nine goals and 20 assists in the final 57 regular-season games.
“Playing with him, me being an older guy, you kind of try to tell him and help him out along the way,” Brouwer said, “but he did a real good job of understanding what his situation was within the team and taking the opportunity that he was given, and he’s really been playing well.”
Kuznetsov picked up his first playoff points on Thursday, scoring the tying goal at 9:05 in the first period when he batted Johansson’s rebound attempt into the net. He then added another goal at 6:19 of the third period, skating through the Islanders’ defense and topping off his march with an eye-opening deke and a deft backhand on goaltender Jaroslav Halak.
He not only led Washington with seven shots on goal, but he entered the game having taken only seven shots on goal in the first four playoff games combined.
“Even when I was sitting him out at times and not playing him, or playing him on the fourth line and different things, as he started to become comfortable in situations, we pointed out situations where he could do it better,” Trotz said. “He always tried to do it better.”
After the regular season had ended, but before the playoffs began, general manager Brian MacLellan said Kuznetsov’s uptick in play had been “a huge addition” to the way the team had played in the final two months, and that “the better he plays, the better we’re going to be as a team.”
Those two goals on Thursday pushed the Capitals to the edge of a series victory. That type of attention — on the team, not on the individual — is what has pleased Kuznetsov the most thus far.
“I never talk about my game,” Kuznetsov repeated. “Lots of people who love talk about hockey, and that’s their job. I just doing my job.”
• Zac Boyer can be reached at zboyer@washingtontimes.com.
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