ARLINGTON, Va. — Alex Ovechkin woke up Friday to the news that defenseman John Carlson had been traded to the Anaheim Ducks and the reality of life on the Washington Capitals without his longtime teammate hit him like nothing previously during his 21 NHL seasons.
“It’s obviously a sad day,” Ovechkin said. “Probably the toughest day in my career, I’m talking about personal-wise. It [stinks]. It’s sad.”
Ovechkin has seen almost all his teammates from Washington’s 2018 Stanley Cup championship team move on. Ovechkin and Tom Wilson were the only players from that team left on the Capitals plane that traveled to face the Boston Bruins at TD Garden on Saturday (12:30 p.m. ET; ABC, SN1, TVAS).
And Ovechkin, the League record holder with 921 career goals who has played his entire NHL career with Washington, could be the next to go.
The 40-year-old left wing is in the final season of the five-year, $47.5 million contract he signed in 2021 and has yet to decide whether he will continue playing in the NHL beyond this season. Ovechkin told NHL.com on Feb. 19 that his decision “probably” will wait until after the season.
Whether the late-night trade of Carlson, one of his closest friends after 17 seasons together, impacts that decision and its timing remains to be seen.
“I don’t know,” Ovechkin said. “I’m still here, so we’ll see. We’ll see what’s going to happen, but, yeah, it’s a hard one.”
From the Capitals perspective, general manager Chris Patrick said trading Carlson before the 2026 NHL Trade Deadline on Friday did not change their approach to Ovechkin’s future. The decision remains up to him.
“Alex and I will just talk about what happened and he’ll be able to vent if he wants to vent,” Patrick said. “I have no sense on what he’s feeling. The great thing about Alex is he’s pretty singularly focused on his team, on his teammates, on playing games and on trying to win, and that’s all he’s been doing.”
Still, Carlson’s departure was the latest signal that we are near the end of the Ovechkin era (2005-present), which has included 16 Stanley Cup Playoff appearances, 11 division titles, and three Presidents’ Trophy wins (first in the NHL in points during regular season) in addition to the 2018 Stanley Cup win.
The Capitals (31-25-7) still have a chance to make the playoffs this season, trailing the Bruins (34-22-5) by four points for the second wild card from the Eastern Conference with 19 games remaining, including their head-to-head meeting in Boston on Saturday and another in Washington on March 14.
But it’s clear that Washington is looking more than ever to the future, and life after Ovechkin. Trading Carlson (17 seasons) after dealing Nic Dowd (eight seasons) to the Vegas Golden Knights on Thursday, removed two of the four longest-tenured players on the Capitals roster, leaving Ovechkin (21 seasons) and Wilson (13 seasons).
For Carlson, a 36-year-old who can become an unrestricted free agent after this season, the Capitals received a conditional first-round pick in the 2026 NHL Draft and a third-round pick in the 2027 NHL Draft. For Dowd, a 35-year-old who is signed for one more season, Washington received goalie prospect Jesper Vikman, a second-round pick in the 2029 NHL Draft and a third-round pick in the 2027 NHL Draft.
“They’re great players, and they’re going to do great where they’ve gone,” Patrick said of Carlson and Dowd. “But at the end of the day, they’re in their mid-30s and our team is starting to have some younger guys step up, and at some point, you need to pass the torch a little bit. So, this allowed us to get some good assets for some players that, realistically, in four years from now probably aren’t on our team.”
