The Washington Capitals are approaching a fork in the road in their season, general manager Brian MacLellan said Saturday.
The team’s top executive spoke with reporters before Washington’s road game in Calgary Saturday, and he said the Capitals have no choice but to start winning games to hop back into the playoff picture.
“At the beginning of the year we dug a hole, and we’re trying to work our way out,” MacLellan said. “We have to put a string of good games together — wins — to stay in it and buy some time until we get some guys back, and hopefully we’re more competitive then.”
“We have to be concerned,” MacLellan also said. “We dug ourselves a hole. The margin for error is pretty slim right now.”
One of the biggest issues for the Capitals this season has been their lack of success on the power play. Washington has the 12th-worst unit in the NHL with a 20.65 power play percentage.
“You can’t have a stretch where your power play is 0-for-21 or something like that,” MacLellan said. “That’s going to hurt you, and it’s been hurting us.”
As of Sunday afternoon, the Capitals are 10-12-4, in third-to-last place in the Metropolitan Division and four points back of the second wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference. MacLellan put cold water on the notion that the team could add meaningful players at the deadline, though. The reason, he said, is because the Capitals have two large-salary players who could come off the long-term injured reserve soon in Tom Wilson and Nicklas Backstrom.
“We have to make room to have them in the lineup [and] to help our team you would have to add a high-end guy, top-six guy, but they are $5 million, $6 million,” he said. “You can’t add that player while you are bringing two guys back from LTI. That’s why we say our top guys have to carry us to that point.”
MacLellan said the organization will have a “better picture” on Wilson’s return timeline later this month, while Backstrom hasn’t suffered any “setbacks” in his recovery from invasive hip surgery.
• Jacob Calvin Meyer can be reached at jmeyer@washingtontimes.com.
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