Without Alex Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom, and Mike Green, this Capitals team is surprisingly similar to the Capitals of almost a decade ago… a hard-charging team that both delighted and frustrated its fans.

How so, you ask? Read on… and while these comparisons are far from perfect, consider them food for thought:

It’s not a perfect match; the old-school Caps had no Karl Alzner, nor a spark-plug like Matt Hendricks, nor a promising young defenseman like Dmitry Orlov. Of course, that team of yore had a disenchanted but still-dangerous Jaromir Jagr—but the current Caps have Ovechkin… and however you feel about Ovie wearing the “C” he’s undoubtedly more deserving than Jagr was, and a wrecking-ball to boot.

Oh, and comparing the coaches falls down just a little bit… while Dale Hunter is another minor-league coach given his first NHL shot with the Caps, he kicks Butch Cassidy’s ass in pretty much every way.

When the 2011-12 team’s Robert Lang (Nicklas Backstrom) and Sergei Gonchar (Mike Green) return from injury, this roster can compete with any in team in the league. The team going through trying times with a depleted roster will build their chemistry and resolve come playoff time.

This limping Capitals team has earned three points in two games, including a tilt against the defending champs… and that’s without three of their big stars. Adding back a healthy Ovechkin, Backstrom, and Green down the stretch improves the team dramatically — but in the meantime, a team forced to play without its superstars is also forced to play a balanced, team-focused game.

If Coach Hunter and the locker-room leaders enforce that team-first mentality when their superstars return… watch out, ’cause these Capitals will be dangerous.

Chimera shot. Cam Ward made sure he missed.

But the rebound came out just in time for Orlov to reach back as he skated past the net, and stick the puck past Ward for his first NHL goal. The smile that flashed on Orlov’s face afterwards pretty much rendered the red goal light unnecessary.  And he put his team up 2-1, which would be the final score.

“Right then and there, you remember your first goal, when you scored your first NHL goal,” said Chimera, who had an assist and a hand in the initial on-ice celebration. “And it’s pretty cool. It’s a cool moment for him. … You wish you could have a camera at that point, ‘cause it’s priceless.”

Capitals forward Troy Brouwer chuckled when being asked about the expression of joy on Orlov’s face after the game.

“I think everyone’s that excited [about their first NHL goal], to be honest with you,” Brouwer said. “It’s such a huge accomplishment. We’re very proud of him.”

Chimera reflected on that first-goal reaction: “When you get your first, a lot of emotions go through your head, a lot of time spent getting there, so it’s a fun moment when you get it.”

Chimera also brought up, unsolicited, how hard Orlov had been working—a compliment in and of itself for the rookie.

It may be only one goal in a 82 (plus?) game season, but it took 20 years of hard work to make it happen. Hopefully more are on the way for the young defenseman.

Meanwhile, on the flip side of the game, team captain Alex Ovechkin had a hit that’s too good not to share on the Carolina Hurricanes’ Tuomo Ruutu, who could only be described as being at the wrong place at the wrong time on this one.  Pass the Tylenol, please.

That’s the situation the Capitals find themselves in now after last night’s 3-1 win over Calgary, which extended (to 4) their longest winning streak since they put together 7 at the beginning of the season.

Yes, since that 7-game run, they’ve changed some of their coaching bench. And yes, they’re playing a new system. But Capitals forward Troy Brouwer points out that at the beginning of the year, while the Capitals started off hot and beat those 7  teams, a lot of NHL clubs were still struggling to find their identity.

“At the beginning of the season, it’s tough. Teams are finding themselves. They’re finding how they’re going to play. Sometimes they have new players, new coaches,” Brouwer said. “We were able to come in and put a couple of really good games together.”

The Capitals went through their own identity crisis about a month later than several teams in the league. Now, finally, Brouwer feels the mood prevalent among the Capitals in that 7-game win streak returning.

“We’re getting our mood back that we had at the beginning of the year,” he said. “It was a lot of fun, obviously, to play in those first 7 games.”

When comparing that run of success to the current one, Brouwer talked about how the Capitals are taking care of their defensive zone more now. He also complimented the goalies’ performances over the past four wins.

Last night against the Flames, the Capitals did a lot of things correctly. Brouwer, for example, got traffic in front of the net and was rewarded for the subsequent body beating with a goal (he told reporters after the game that head coach Dale Hunter said if he didn’t get in front of the net, he wouldn’t be on the ice for the man advantage).  The Flames had only 19 shots on goal – the fewest the Caps have allowed under Hunter. Playing with 7 defenseman—since Mike Green returned to the lineup Tuesday (no points, one penalty, and even on the plus-minus)—didn’t appear to cause any wrinkles in the Capitals’ plans either. The game included a perfect penalty kill and two power play goals for the Capitals, one coming from Alex Ovechkin.

“We’re just starting to play together as a group. We’re getting excited to play each game –coming to the rink, everyone’s enjoying themselves and having a good time, but at the same time put[ting] in the work,” Ward said, though when asked if the excitement or feeling of playing as a team was lacking before, he said he couldn’t really pinpoint what made the Capitals slide after winning 7 but added that they had needed to “get back to just honest hard work at both ends of the ice.”

Ward – who had five fewer shifts Tuesday but whose average shift length during the game jumped by about  16 seconds—also said Ovechkin’s strong play in the past few games is also helping his teammates.

Ward agreed when asked if winning seems to make the game simpler, or, as he said it, slower.  Brouwer had a slightly different twist.

“You make it simpler. When you are winning, things come easier. You’re not forcing things. Maybe in the Columbus game [Dec. 31] when we were coming back, we were trying to force a few plays, but it ended up working because we had some good pressure, no turnovers, stuff like that, “ Brouwer said. “When you’re losing, it’s tough to try and play that simple game. You want to do a little bit more than you maybe should.”

A few quick thoughts:

• Is the Beast back? In a modest 18 minutes of ice time last night the Gr8 pumped 7 shots on the Senators’ cage, and they were all of the quality variety. It was vintage Ovi. Since the coaching change he has certainly been more an impactful performer, but last night he seemed to put it all together at last, and that dazzling, game-changing tally — and I think it belongs among his 10 best tallies ever as a Cap — may represent his personal crossing of the rubicon this season.

• Can someone please get Brooks Laich a stick that actually stays in one piece on the penalty kill?

• Props to Dale Hunter for trying out that Halpern/Johannson/Brouwer combination. That was, to my knowledge, one of the few combinations we hadn’t seen yet in Washington, but it was a nice mix of veteran experience and younger spark.

• Karl Alzner’s paycheck should get a bonus; there was one moment (I think it was on the penalty kill) where he threw his body on the right half of the goal line because Vokoun left it exposed while there was significant traffic and a battle for the puck going on in front of the net.

• More thoughts Ovi: I haven’t seen him play quite like that since before John Wall joined the Wizards. He’s actually getting to the net again on occasion when he charges into the offensive zone by himself, from out wide, where he generates lethal speed on a bull-rush, and his goal was a beautiful mix of skill, will, cunning, and flair. Ovechkin flair — which of course is unlike anyone else’s in hockey. He’ll probably be a stronger player for going through this protracted slump.

• 44 shots on goal. Not bad. A power play goal. Not bad. Still lots of work to do on the PK (bad). Allowing Ottawa to score on the power play to make it 4-3 late, needlessly injecting drama into the evening, falls (again) at the stick of the undisciplined and unpredictable Alexander Semin, but a crazy shot from John Carlson in his own zone that hit an empty net was a pretty fun way to get insurance.

• On Semin: Just as we may have witnessed Alexander Ovechkin chart a positive and productive new course with last night’s effort, I’m left wondering just how much more the new coach has to see of Ovechkin’s countryman before an ultimate verdict is rendered. At 4-2 deep in the third on the road, the game needs to go in lockdown, and that’s not a task you look to #28 to carry out.

• It’s actually difficult for me to pick a favorite goal in this game: the beauty by Ovechkin, the gorgeous pass by Laich to Backstrom as they came flying towards the net and the successful shot by Nick, and a somewhat similar goal off a pass from Johannson to Brouwer.

Perhaps a statement win for Dale Hunter. A relief win for the fanbase. Most importantly, perhaps: a night we’ll look back on and say, “That’s when Ovi got his groove back.”

There’s standup, and then there’s what Gabby offered the Washington Post’s Tarik El Bashir Wednesday morning — actually agreeing with Capitals management that it was time for a change behind the bench. He actually told General Manager George McPhee, “You’re doing what you have to do.” A company man in this sport if there ever was one. He’d just been terminated from his dream job, and still his thoughts were with what was best for the team.

On November 17 the Caps were in Winnipeg, and after they’d fallen behind 4-1 after 40 minutes, most listlessly, I sensed, really for the very first time, that we were watching the onset of destruction. The very next morning I took to Twitter and made explicit my concern: “The biggest indictment of this team was the final frame. Teams with pride and character make it 4-2 or 4-3, to build on for the next outing.”

I reference this moment because when Tarik yesterday morning asked Boudreau when he sensed that things might be slipping from his control the coach pointed to November 17 in Winnipeg.

Way back in January I published a highly unflattering, highly critical two-part read on the struggling, soft and identity-challenged Caps, calling them out for operating in a what I regarded as a “country club” atmosphere of luxury, comfort and precious little accountability that, from where I blogged, undermined an ethos of night-in, night-out hunger and drive — most particularly relative to the lunch pale Capitals rosters of 15-plus years ago. You know, the types of teams Dale Hunter played on here. And last season I also pulled no punches with respect to commenting on the increasing frequency with which Washington hockey fans were taking to social media to share photos and accounts of nightclub encounters with members of the team at troubling hours, and with troubling frequency. And so it was most interesting for me to take in the NHL Network’s coverage of Monday’s drama, Monday night, and hear Billy Jaffe suggest that under Dale Hunter there could be no serious commitment to winning when it mattered without the Caps mending their “clubbing” ways, while Joe Beninati not long later alluded to a “country club atmosphere” taking hold in recent years. The Washington Post’s Tom Boswell authored what I thought was the most severe indictment of the Boudreau era, but taking pains, to his credit, to also assign blame to upper management.

“During the offseason two ex-Capitals went public about the country club atmosphere that undermined discipline on the team. Once you’ve tolerated a star system for years, how can the same coach possibly reverse the trend?”

About a week ago, right as I began sensing that things were truly boiling over, I sent email to some reporters here suggesting that Jason Arnott would be in a unique position to comment on troubles that festered last season and perhaps metastasized this. Arnott had been afforded an inside look at the team last spring and then departed town — having arrived here with great fanfare at the trade deadline as a coveted leadership asset — with nary a word said about it, and having landed quite well in St. Louis this season. To his credit again, Tarik button-holed Arnott out at Kettler on Monday. You might say that in D.C. Arnott saw a loose ship being captained.

“It’s very hard. When you let guys do what they please, what they want [emphasis OFB's], then you come in and get hard on them, it’s pretty tough.”

But by no means should Bruce Boudreau alone be scapegoated for the country club atmosphere — and Boswell emphasizes this in his column. Boudreau wasn’t in D.C. when the Caps drafted Ovechkin and subsequently devised elaborate and clever and highly successive marketing campaigns for him his first two seasons. The coddling and deification of the extraordinary talent began from day one. With Alexander Ovechkin the Capitals, for the first time in their history, had an opportunity to create their Elvis (thin and fat), and they did.

There were no larger-than-life figures on that ’98 Capitals club, captained by the legend, that made it to the Stanley Cup finals, were there? Just food for thought.

So you know that my concerns with the Caps date back deep into last season and you should know too that I opened this season with a renewal of them — I titled my season preview ‘Questions for a Hockey Club at a Crossroads.’ In it I identified Bruce Boudreau as a figure who had to demonstrate marked improvement at his job: “Much as the Capitals’ core roster has experienced growing pains in its path toward legitimate contention, so too has Head Coach Bruce Boudreau. Put bluntly: he’s underwhelmed a lot of observers with his handling of the Capitals’ recent postseasons, and in fact in the judgment of many been out-coached by less experienced bench bosses of lower-seeded clubs.”

I didn’t write this sentiment for that preview file, but I did suggest to a few of my blogger chums here that it was not at all beyond the realm of possibility that the Caps could can Boudreau at about the 25-game mark. I specifically wondered how McPhee would react if, for instance, the Caps were behind Tampa Bay in the Southeast division then. Like I think everyone else, I had no idea we’d see what we have this season from the Panthers. Anyway, my hypothesis occasioned a torrent of email protest back from my chums: “No way; he’s years left on his deal; Ted’s too cheap.” (They really wrote me that.) The Moral: When a team goes bad any GM who values his job will pull the trigger, no matter (within reason) the financial fallout.

* * * * *

I’m closing this file with a very personal feel-good story. Last night the Buffalo Sabres recalled Joe Finley. In the summer of 2010 Fins kept a diary during Capitals’ Development Camp for OFB. It was a really fun project, and I enjoyed most that Big Joe had a lot of fun with it. Meeting him for that project remains one of the great rewards I’ve derived from this blogging gig. Big Joe is a true gentle giant, truly one of the friendliest people I’ve met in the sport.

During his development time with the Caps Fins suffered injury after injury, and finally, at the end of last season, the team did what most teams do after a first-round pick fails to show some durable glimmer that all of that development investment was paying off: they cut ties with him.

Buffalo invited Fins to training camp this fall, and he showed well enough to earn an AHL contract with the Sabres’ American League affiliate in Rochester. With the Amerks Fins has been what the Buffalo News this week termed “a revelation.” Through 18 games this season Big Joe has seriously thrown his weight around (57 PIMs), and played so strongly that he’s earned a shut-down designation with the top pairing on the Rochester blueline. His +10 is best on the team. It’s a terrific story, capped by his earning this week a three-year, two-way contract with the Sabres and last night’s callup. I sent him a congratulatory note the other day, in which I somewhat jokingly expressed remorse that the Caps hadn’t held on to him one year longer, given the arrival of the new sheriff in town. He agreed.

Was the Capitals’ excessive time in the d-zone Tuesday just growing pains?

How fast can we expect Hunter to install his system?

One of Ovi’s rushes into the o-zone tonight ended up in an assist –has Hunter solved the Ovi/breakaway frustration?

Ted and I discuss this, and I try to force Ted to call a win/loss for the Caps-Pens tilt Thursday.

“Fat fuck!”

Most unfortunate words to measure by. But measure we must, especially now. They represent, I wager, a point of no return for this Capitals club — under this leadership regime.

One thing about wearing hockey no. 8 in Washington — you know the high-definition cameras are ever on you, from numerous angles, and on November 1, late in the evening against Anaheim, the Capitals’ captain, unceremoniously benched for a game-deciding shift, knew full well his obscene reaction would be captured for all the world to see.

The conventional interpretation at the time was that the fiery captain was merely giving vent to frustration. His competitive combativeness just got the better of him, you know. Certainly the Capitals would have you believe that. Problem is, this is not a fiery captain. Also, not an accomplished one. In fact, this season, he’s largely a lethargic, very minus-skating, very ordinary looking captain. Another problem with that initial interpretation is that the Capitals and their captain had already started their standings descent under this coach, again, and the circumstances that have followed the remainder of this November fairly beg for a reconsideration of that remarkable moment. Prior to November 1, when did you ever encounter a moment of such insolence from the guy wearing the ‘C’ on your beloved team’s sweater? Not in this town, not with this team.

This morning, we could look back on November 1 and Ovi’s outburst and deem it a moment of contempt . . . a mutinous moment, in fact.

And if the captain isn’t all in, what’s the likelihood all his teammates are? It would be interesting, would it not, to poll all those Hockey News writers and editors who fancied the Caps the Cup favorite back in late summer, this very morning, and see where they stand now.

* * * * *

For me, the very first serious warning sign arrived early in April 2010, just days before the start of that season’s postseason. The Capitals, running away with the Southeast division en route to a 121-pt. regular season, went to Columbus and held off an under-manned but tenacious Bluejackets team, winning 3-2. After the game, Bluejackets center R. J. Umberger told the Columbus Dispatch that the Capitals were a bunch of floaters, that theirs wasn’t a game ready for the prime time of the postseason. In the humility-laden sport of pro hockey, this was a serious callout.

“A good defensive team is going to beat them (in the playoffs),” Umberger told the Dispatch. “If you eliminate your turnovers and keep them off the power play, they’re going to get frustrated because they’re in their zone a lot.” Umberger’s comments proved prescient; about three weeks later the Montreal Canadiens would author one of the great shockers in the history of NHL postseason hockey, eliminating the 121-pt. Caps in the first round, executing with unwavering discipline a bunched-in box of a defensive shell against Gabby’s floaters. Bruce Boudreau’s postseason ledger in Washington fell to 1-3. For me, that series was a serious warning sign.

* * * * *

Aside from the particulars of Umberger’s critique, in a larger sense he was calling into question the Capitals’ identity. Failure, which Umberger forecasted a fait accompli for the Caps, would render Bruce Boudreau’s finesse attack a fad. There are few critiques more derisive of a hockey team than being branded “floaters.” Umberger played a key role in the Flyers’ team that dispatched Gabby’s Caps in round one in April 2008.

Saturday night in Buffalo, facing a Sabres team ludicrously beyond depleted by injury — nine regulars missing from the Buffalo lineup — Capitals skaters opted to sit back and attack their wet-behind-the-ears adversaries with a patient, largely forecheck-free strategy of counter-punching. In its conclusion the 5-1 debacle — the second consecutive Saturday night massacre against a slightly better than average American Hockey League outfit — occasioned a near aneurysm from Comcast’s Alan May on ‘Capitals Postgame.’  “This is a hockey team without an identity,” May sternly lamented.

May’s in-studio broadcast partner, Al Koken, was left similarly crestfallen and rage-filled by the shocking showing. He directed a very big-picture question to the very unsuspecting game call team of Joe B and Craig during the postgame, asking the duo to reflect on “where this organization is” right now. Not a question merely about a seriously struggling hockey team, but an interrogatory directed at the heart of the organization as a whole. A commendably gutsy bit of journalism on Koken’s part. Watching on television, a viewer in that moment felt the discomfort it caused the game’s broadcasters. Joe B was able only to stammer out something about the Caps needing better goaltending, as if this team was merely a Band-Aid between the pipes away from prosperity, then followed with speculation that things may be so dire that Gabby would have to return to his now infamous trap of a season ago. Imagine.

Question: How is it possible that four years into Gabby’s tenure we are at pains to identify an identity for this $60 million hockey club?

This is quite literally the case: on any given night, no matter the standing of the opponent, and certainly no matter the volume of regulars potentially missing from the foe’s lineup, we have no idea what Capitals team will show up. We also have no idea what Capitals team will show up from period to period.

I consider this a gravely serious warning sign.

* * * * *

Much was made in the preseason of what was perceived to be savvy veteran additions brought in during the offseason by general manager George McPhee. In hindsight, too often the Capitals competed in the postseason in recent years with too inexperienced a lineup, the theory went. This fall, we are learning that this notably more experienced team is mentally, psychologically fragile. Karl Alzner addressed this trait head-on in the aftermath of last Friday night’s blowout loss to the Rangers.

Mentally weak hockey clubs reflect poorly on that team’s leadership. Put another way: How often have you heard it said of Babcock’s Wings or Bylsma’s Pens that they yield a goal or two at inopportune times and . . . turtle?

I consider this yet another warning sign.

* * * * *

That 7-0 start to the season seems positively aberrational. We were startled by the commitment the Capitals showed then to crashing the opposition cage, to getting goals in the proverbial ‘ugly’ fashion — the way you need to in the postseason. It didn’t last. This month, most often, when the Capitals prevail it’s been in a white-knuckle affair, no matter the caliber of opponent. When they lose, which is often, often they’re blown out. This, too, I consider a dire warning sign.

* * * * *

More gutsy journalism: Saturday night the Washington Times‘ Dan Daly directed a tweet my way in which he alleged that the Capitals are big on marketing and branding but conspicuous under-achievers with what really matters. What’s amazing is that the Caps go to such great lengths to create a “brand,” and yet they have no “identity,” Daly tweeted. Again with the identity issue. I hadn’t truly reflected in such fashion until prompted to by Daly. I confess, painfully: I am 100 percent in agreement with him.

* * * * *

By no means is this viewpoint meant to scapegoat Bruce Boudreau. In fact, whether he stays or goes, there remain gravely serious questions about Ovechkin’s fitness for team captain. And what of this fragile team psyche meme that Alzner honed in on? Maybe it’s a byproduct of an organization spending years overly catering toward, and coddling, it’s $10 million dollar man. “Branding” rather than competing especially well, as Dan Daly puts it.

I chatted about this whole mess with my father last night. He and I enjoyed an amazing father-son weekend for the Winter Classic up in Pittsburgh almost a year ago. I told him, Pops, you know what I enjoyed most about that weekend? As magnificent as the Red Army was in that football stadium during the national anthem, as euphoric as our victory walk out of it was at night’s end, what I enjoyed most was the thoroughly unexpected performance of the Capitals’ alumni against the vaunted and much younger and much more star-studded Pens alumni. It was just like old times. We out-worked them. We out-hustled them. We battled til the end. We stunned them.    

I want that Capitals ethos back. Do whatever it takes to secure it.

True, it was only by 47 seconds, and since Ovechkin finished with 21 shifts and Semin only 19, it looks more coincidental than any kind of message being sent from the bench. Semin finished Friday with the longest average shift length on the team (that’s one way to get more ice time–just stay out there).

But it’s just one example of the disjointed 60 minutes that saw the New York Rangers beat the Capitals 6-3, a surprising score for a game that had no goals in the first period.

Another example: Boudreau said after Wednesday night’s game that the Capitals felt they needed to be in the ’30′ range on hits to succeed and play their style. On Friday, the Capitals finished with 40 hits to New York’s 28, yet they lost by three goals. Theoretically, hitting and d-zone coverage should not be mutually exclusive but, by the end of the night, that was the reality for Washington.

And in the latest episode of where in the world will Brooks Laich play next, Friday’s game saw Laich begin as a forward, then switch to defense near the end of the third period. Unfortunately, the Rangers scored just as easily with him on defense, adding their sixth goal of the game.

“We were going with four D, and I didn’t want to kill them, and at that time, Brooks has played D before, so I thought it would give them a rest and maybe add a little offense–we were only down 2, but unfortunately, that backfired,” Boudreau said.

Meanwhile, Friday saw another exchange of roles on the top line for at least one shift. Troy Brouwer’s specialty is creating space with hits. When he plays on the top line, that’s supposed to mean more space for offensive rockstars Ovechkin and Backstrom. But on Friday, it was a beautiful check by Ovechkin that freed the puck and enabled Nicklas Backstrom to make a gorgeous pass that led to a Brouwer goal.

“He made a great play–finished his check. We had talked about it right before we went on the ice for the shift–turn the puck over, and Nicky made a great play,” Brouwer said of Ovechkin. “He’s that type of player. He’s physical. Maybe that role’s been taken off him a bit this year.”

As long as someone gets a goal, it’s a good thing, right? Ovechkin finished the night with 8 hits, easily the team best.

Ovechkin eventually scored a goal of his own, and Nicklas Backstrom finished with two assists. Dmitri Orlov, paired for most of the evening with Karl Alzner, got his second career NHL assist on a power play goal by John Carlson.

The pairing is a slight adjustment for Alzner, too, though he calls Orlov an “NHL-caliber player.”

“I got to make sure I’m really aware out there,” Alzner said, citing the language barrier. “Sometimes I might call something he might not understand. He might think I’m calling for a d to d, and I’m actually calling a rim or something. So it’s just being a little bit more aware on my behalf.”

Overall, it’s probably 60 minutes the Capitals will appreciate putting behind them when they face the Sabres this evening. Brouwer said the team was simply flat and didn’t play with urgency. Perhaps last night’s loss will give them the impetus they need tonight in Buffalo.