The Capitals were honest following their 4-0 shutout loss to the Penguins to open the 2023-24 campaign.
New head coach Spencer Carbery was blunt when it came to the Washington Capitals' performance in a 4-0 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins in their season opener.
"It's sort of the worst-scripted start we possibly could have had," he declared.
The 41-year-old bench boss saw things fall apart in his NHL head coaching debut, as the Capitals offense failed to execute and managed just 18 shots on goal while going 0-for-3 on the power play.
At the other end of the ice, the defense and penalty kill faltered (1-for-3), and despite a handful of ten-bell saves from Charlie Lindgren, Washington surrendered four goals. Three of those tallies came on plays where Pittsburgh's top contributors were left alone and given plenty of time and space to convert.
"We put him in a tough spot. He wasn't slated to play today; we just didn't help him. That's disappointing," Carbery said, noting, "Home ice, trying to generate some momentum from a season standpoint, and that certainly did not happen... when you look at the whole body of work, probably as disappointing as it could be scripted.
"We couldn't stop the bleeding," he added simply. "
It marks the first time in Washington's 49-year history that the team has been shut out in a season opener. While there were moments of sustained pressure, Washington elected to pass and try to wear down the opposition, and spent too much time on the perimeter instead of generating opportunities in tight.
"There was definitely some of those times where, when you have teams on the ropes, it's easy to kind of just want to play possession and find something and keep wearing them down," John Carlson pointed out. "But I think it comes to an end, because there's no perfect changes. I think you're also skating around the zone pretty fast, and if you don't strike and really put them on their heels, then one little bounce of the puck, one little nice play by them, and then you wasted a perfect opportunity to get into attack mode or turn it into a regroup or something like that."
"Yeah, I mean, that's an area where we got to better if we want to score goals," Backstrom added. "I mean, usually goals are scored right in front there, so more shots, more traffic, and I think it's not the start we wanted but we'll get another practice before next game and hopefully just clean that up and move forward."
Ultimately, he and captain Alex Ovechkin are eager to turn the page and show that they still have "something to prove," which is the team's battle cry this season.
"It's not the start we want... Just move on. How I said we didn't get the results, you know? Boys was ready, but we gonna watch the video and gonna play better the next game," Ovechkin said.
More postgame tidbits:
Ovechkin takes blame for Malkin's goal: "First of all, it was my bad on that goal kind of off my stick go to blue line and went their way. But you know, I think we play well first period. Second one, we didn't score, they score and that kind of the game."
Backstrom on Lindgren: "Yeah I mean, he was great and made a lot of good saves. We all know what he's capable of, he's very calm back there, very cool."
John Carlson on sustaining pressure/what went wrong: "If we're looking at strictly scoring chances, we had enough to put a couple goals at least. WHen you don't bear down a little bit,w hen they make big saves, they get the momentum. It's all part of the game, and I think we could've been better at that."
Backstrom on moving on: "It happens. It's not the way we want, but I mean, I think a lot of areas that we can be better, be smarter with the pucka dn I don't know, it's just tough to see when we're not executing."
Carbery on changing the lines/pairings in the second: "Just trying to find a spark, trying to find something that's working that's going to be able to shift, to give us some momentum."