Though there appears to be no urgency on Ovechkin\u2019s part to come to a decision on whether he\u2019ll continue playing, it is safe to say Wilson is hoping the NHL\u2019s all-time leader in goals with 929 returns for a 22nd season in the League. The pending unrestricted free agent has spent all of them with the Capitals and been Wilson\u2019s teammate for the past 13.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s the best, he\u2019s truly the best. Such a great guy, such a fun guy, such a huge part of our team,\u201d said Wilson, speaking at a taping of the game show “The Price Is Right Tonight.” \u201cSo we will see. He gets to do whatever the heck he wants and he gets to do it however he wants to do it because that\u2019s what legends get to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
If Ovechkin, who has been the Capitals captain since 2010, does return, Wilson sees no reason why his fellow forward would not continue to produce at an elite level despite that fact that he\u2019ll turn 41 on Sept. 17. This season, Ovechkin led the Capitals in goals (32) and points (64) while playing all 82 games.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs long as he is around, he is going to be \u2018Ovi,\u2019\u201d Wilson said. \u201cI\u2019ve never seen anything like it. The hunger, the passion, he wants to score goals more than anybody. The ability to push himself to continue to be great every single year, whatever pressure or milestones are on the horizon, he just crushes right through them. I don\u2019t expect that if he comes back it will be any different. I\u2019ve never really thought about the day without Ovi in Washington, so we will cross that bridge when we get there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wilson said the Capitals (43-30-9) missing the Stanley Cup Playoffs this season left a \u201cbad taste in our mouths\u201d after they won the Metropolitan Division in in 2024-25 with a 51-22-9 record and 111 points. Washington finished three points behind the Philadelphia Flyers for third place in the Metropolitan and four points behind the Ottawa Senators for the second wild card into the playoffs from the Eastern Conference.<\/p>\n
However, the Capitals have been active already this offseason, adding forward Jordan Kyrou<\/a> in a trade with the St. Louis Blues<\/a> on Tuesday for forward Connor McMichael<\/a>, forward prospect Milton Gastrin and a first-round pick in the 2026 NHL Draft. On Wednesday, they acquired forward Alex Tuch<\/a> in a sign-and-trade with the Buffalo Sabres<\/a>, sending forward David Kampf<\/a>\u00a0and a third-round pick in the 2027 NHL Draft to Buffalo. Tuch, who could have become an unrestricted free agent July 1, will begin a new eight-year, $84 million contract ($10.5 million average annual value) next season.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s our management showing us like, \u2018Hey we\u2019re not sitting back, we\u2019re joining the arms race and we are going to go out and try to win a championship,\u2019 so I\u2019m really excited about it,\u201d Wilson said.<\/p>\n \u201cKyrou is as skilled as they come. He\u2019s quite the player. Getting Jordan, he\u2019s just a high-end elite talent and anytime you can get guys like that, you get really excited about it. It\u2019s always a tough day because you feel sad on the one end with a teammate leaving, but then you flip your mind and get really excited about the opportunity coming in. It\u2019s time for us to make some noise.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Though there appears to be no urgency on Ovechkin\u2019s part to come to a decision on whether he\u2019ll…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":758596,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":["post-758595","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758595","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=758595"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758595\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/758596"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=758595"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=758595"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=758595"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}