So What About The New Caps Coach?

Spencer Carbery is young and promising, but the odds are against him

Image courtesy of the Washington Capitals.

A little more than six weeks after the Washington Capitals opted not to renew the contract of former head coach Peter Laviolette, the team announced it has hired Spencer Carbery, an assistant coach with the Toronto Maple Leafs, as its new head coach. The deal is reportedly for four seasons, which is a little longer than usual for a first time NHL head coach and a reflection of the fact that Carbery was a man in demand who had other options if the Caps didn’t offer him what he wanted.

While Carbery is credited with successfully revamping Toronto’s power play, the real key here is his long service with Caps organization in the minor leagues, where he was head coach with both of the team’s affiliates, the AHL Hershey Bears and the South Carolina Stingrays of the ECHL. Carbery even suited up for the Stingrays for a couple of seasons before retiring as a player to pursue a career in coaching.

Spencer Carbery by Aesav23 is licensed under CC BY 3.0.

What else is there to say about Carbery? Reportedly, the Caps had ticketed him as a future NHL head coach while he was still in Hershey, and wanted to keep him stashed there in case of an emergency, but couldn’t keep him away from the job with Toronto. He’s the tenth head coach of the Ted Leonsis era and the ninth hire (Ron Wilson being inherited from late owner Abe Pollin). Like six of the eight previous hires of the Leonsis era, Carbery is a first time NHL head coach. Under Leonsis, head coaches have lasted an average of a little over two full seasons behind the bench, so while Carbery’s contract might be for four seasons, history suggests his stay will be shorter.

The Caps are a team that is in the midst of a transition, and the Carbery hiring was just the first step in the process being quarterbacked by General Manager Brian MacLellan. The Caps missed the playoffs last season for just the second time since 2007, and the roster needs re-tooling if they re going to get back to the postseason in a competitive Eastern Conference packed with a lot of talented and youthful teams.¹ Between the NHL Draft at the end of June and free agency in July, MacLellan will be very busy re-racking the roster and it will be Carbery’s job to glue it together in time for Opening Night in October.

If that was Carbery’s only job, it would be challenging enough. But just as important, he has to find a way not just to win, but to win while helping Alex Ovechkin catch Wayne Gretzky as the greatest goal scorer in the history of the NHL. Given that the Caps can’t win without Ovechkin scoring gobs of goals, the two objectives are inextricably linked. But father time always wins, and Ovechkin, as great as he is, will turn 38 (!) before the team returns to the ice next season.

So when Carbery opens training camp with the Caps in September, he’ll be a rookie NHL head coach charged with leading a roster laden with veterans more susceptible to injury who are expected to not only return to the playoffs but help one of the game’s all-time greats catch the greatest hockey player who ever lived. I would have thought that would have been a task better handled by a grizzled NHL lifer like Gerard Gallant. If not him, Tampa Bay assistant Jeff Halpern, a former Cap and a native Washingtonian who played alongside Ovechkin earlier in his career, would have been a logical choice too.

But the job falls to Carbery who faces the greatest challenge of his career, certainly one far more challenging than if he had taken a job with another team starting a rebuild. When I think of Carbery, it’s hard not to think of another Caps coaching hire from the past, Bruce Cassidy. After getting the team back to the playoffs in 2003, Cassidy was fired the following December after being unable to bring the team together behind Jaromir Jagr (that roster was aging too). Cassidy reportedly clashed with players, many of whom believed the first time head coach was unprepared for the demands at the NHL level.

After leaving Washington, it took Cassidy more than 13 years to get another chance at the top job with an NHL team when he was hired by the Boston Bruins in 2017. Once he got his second chance, it was clear he had learned a few things in his time away from the top flight of professional hockey. In just 48 hours, Cassidy will be behind the bench as the head coach for the Vegas Golden Knights as they play Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals. NB: Vegas Team President George McPhee was the General Manager in Washington who hired Cassidy to coach the Caps back in 2002.

I’m not saying that Carbery is unprepared for life as an NHL head coach. Everything I read about him suggests that he’s more than ready. I have to conclude that Washington will merely be the first stop in a long career for Carbery, one that will probably see its greatest success in another NHL city. Still, I’m looking forward to seeing what MacLellan gives Carbery to work with in training camp in September.

1. Take a look at the teams that made the playoffs in the East this season. Which team could the Caps could potentially displace? Now, take a second look at the teams who didn’t make the playoffs in the East. How will the Caps prevent another team on the outside looking in, perhaps Buffalo, from making the postseason?