{"id":755982,"date":"2026-07-11T04:15:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-11T04:15:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/755982\/"},"modified":"2026-07-11T04:15:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-11T04:15:08","slug":"these-guys-look-like-the-harlem-globetrotters-breaking-the-puck-out-alex-tuch-says-playing-against-capitals-convinced-him-to-come-to-washington","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/755982\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018These guys look like the Harlem Globetrotters breaking the puck out\u2019: Alex Tuch says playing against Capitals convinced him to come to Washington"},"content":{"rendered":"

After years of playing against the Washington Capitals<\/a>, newly-acquired winger Alex Tuch<\/a> is glad to be on their side of the ice. The Capitals\u2019 2025-26 season may have ended without a playoff run, but the team\u2019s skill still impressed Tuch, enough to convince him to ink an an eight-year deal<\/a> in a sign-and-trade between the Capitals and Buffalo Sabres<\/a> in June.<\/p>\n

Tuch\u2019s most memorable games agains the Capitals came during the 2018 Stanley Cup Final, when he went up against Washington in his rookie season with the Vegas Golden Knights<\/a> (and was famously on the wrong side of Braden Holtby\u2019s legendary save in Game 2<\/a>). But once he joined the Sabres in 2021, he faced the Caps more frequently as an in-conference opponent, and he doesn\u2019t remembers those games fondly.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Capitals were miserable to play against. I thought they were heavy, they were hard,\u201d Tuch told 106.7 The Fan\u2019s Sports Junkies<\/a> last week. \u201cThey move the puck really well out of their D-zone too, which was something I was looking around and was like, holy crap, these guys look like the Harlem Globetrotters breaking the puck out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Battling against savvy puck movers like Cole Hutson<\/a>, Ryan Leonard<\/a>, and Jakob Chychrun<\/a> reminded Tuch of the Globetrotters\u2019 signature trick shots and high-level skills, executed with precision and cohesiveness.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re all connected, five-man units coming out of the zone,\u201d Tuch said of the Capitals.<\/p>\n

In addition to their awe-inducing moves, Tuch paid attention to the Capitals\u2019 strong record over his decade-long NHL career, watching Washington win four Metropolitan Division titles. He wasn\u2019t deterred by the Capitals\u2019 missing the playoffs this spring, especially after their Eastern Conference-winning season in 2024-25.<\/p>\n

\u201cComing in, I was like \u2018Okay, I don\u2019t think this team is very different than they were two years ago when they won the Metro, and they were looked at as contenders,\u201d he said. \u201cI just think they ran into some injury trouble. And sometimes teams can get derailed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tuch cited Pierre-Luc Dubois\u2019<\/a> injury as an especially tough blow for the Capitals. Dubois missed more than three months of the season after undergoing abdominal and abductor surgery<\/a> and ultimately played just 29 games in 2025-26.<\/p>\n

Tuch also spoke highly of Spencer Carbery, who signed an extension earlier this offseason<\/a>. \u201cThe coach is young, [he\u2019s a] Jack Adams winner and just signed for another three years,\u201d he said on Grant and Danny<\/a>. \u201cThat stability really helped.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ultimately, Tuch said, coming to Washington gives him a chance to compete. \u201cThe most important thing to me is winning,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s one of the reasons why I joined the team.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After years of playing against the Washington Capitals, newly-acquired winger Alex Tuch is glad to be on their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":755983,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-755982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=755982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755982\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/755983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=755982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=755982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=755982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}