Stanley Cup playoffs: Washington Capitals put philosophical differences to the test

On the morning of Dec. 13, Bruce Boudreau arrived at the Washington Capitals’ Arlington training facility as he would any morning during the season, just after 7. In the restless hours immediately preceding, Boudreau’s club had endured the most ignominious defeat of his three-year tenure as coach: a 7-0 humiliation by the New York Rangers, the team’s sixth loss in a row. In the hours ahead, nothing short of a sea change awaited the organization. “We had to do something,” Boudreau said.

When Boudreau took over the Capitals in November 2007, he helped transform a gifted but moribund roster into one of the most entertaining teams in the NHL, a goal-scoring machine that overwhelmed opponents with talent, skill and a wide-open, risk-taking style. But that Monday morning, when Boudreau sat down with his boss, General Manager George McPhee, both men knew another transformation was necessary. Capitals coaches and officials huddled. As the players trickled in for a practice session the next day. tension filled the building.

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“I didn’t know if George was going to come down and scream at us,” veteran forward Mike Knuble said. “There was something that was going to happen that day. You kind of come in, waiting to see.”

No one lost his job that morning. Instead, Boudreau and McPhee decided to replace the team’s trademark — offense — with defense. The risks were significant. The Capitals entered the season with one goal: win the Stanley Cup. Could a team, in the middle of the season, fundamentally alter both its physical style and its mental approach and emerge in better position?

“It was a dramatic change,” McPhee said late last month. “And changing systems in the middle of the season is dangerous, because if it doesn’t work, you have players who are confused. Your system of play has to become ingrained. It has to become second nature. You can’t go on the ice thinking about a system because then the game’s going to be going by you.”

As the Capitals open the playoffs Wednesday night against the same Rangers who instigated the change, they say their new system is ingrained, and their goal of winning the Stanley Cup appears much more achievable than it did that distressing Monday morning last December. The team that posted the best record and scored the most goals in the NHL a year ago averaged more than a goal per game fewer during this regular season. Its most talented stars, led by two-time league MVP Alex Ovechkin, endured what appear statistically to be among the worst seasons of their careers.

The flip side, though, shows that what Boudreau and McPhee set out to accomplish in the middle of December worked: Just three teams allowed fewer goals than the Capitals. And no team in the Eastern Conference, from that point on, posted a better record. Washington, playing a different style, is again the top seed in the East.

“They still have that talent,” said Eric Staal of the Carolina Hurricanes, who played the Capitals six times this season. “Now, they’re just playing a smarter game. I think they’re definitely a tougher team to play against now than they have been in the past. As a whole, as a team, they play a tougher brand of hockey.”