The Pittsburgh Penguins are in a state of transition but have only laid the groundwork to get from here to there, that mysterious era beyond the core led by Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, and Kris Letang. In fact, last summer, the Penguins added to the core with Erik Karlsson, but it wasn’t enough to reverse the playoff slide. Conversely, the rival Washington Capitals have done a lot of things differently.

The division matters most to Penguins president of hockey operations/GM Kyle Dubas.

“That’s the way that I always looked at things. Rather than try to stack ourselves up against all 31 other teams–Let’s focus on our division, and let’s focus on trying to win our division,” Dubas explained one year ago. “We play the most games there. That’s what’s going to set our playoff seeding.”

Pittsburgh Hockey Now will complete a full analysis of the Penguins against the Metro Divison, beginning with the hated Washington Capitals.

Fans and players alike hold some animosity, but the organizations set about different paths several years ago.

Penguins vs. Capitals

The two teams last met in the playoffs in Round Two, 2018. It was the end of the Penguins’ back-to-back Stanley Cup run and the beginning of the first Capitals Cup celebration.

The aging Lions of the Eastern Conference might have been the two best teams in the Conference (or NHL?) for three years running, and their playoff battles in 2016 and 2017 were epic. The intensity in Capital One Arena before Game 7 of the 2017 series was so thick that I found myself needing to talk a walk outside the arena, only to find that some Penguins employees had the same feeling.

Since then, the teams have diverged on building and rebuilding. The Capitals kept most of their first-round picks while the succession of GMs from Jim Rutherford to Ron Hextall and Kyle Dubas threw those picks at veterans to win now.

Obviously, it didn’t work so well for the Penguins, who have not won a playoff series since Round One 2018.

While the Penguins were catapulting their top picks around the league, the Capitals kept theirs, trading only one since 2018 (2021). Beginning with the 2019 draft class, six Washington picks have since made their NHL debuts, including Connor McMichael (2019) and Ivan Miroshnichenko (2022).

As a result, Washington has a wave of young players ready for NHL action, or as they did this summer, able to create enough depth that (then) GM Brian McClellan was able to spend assets to acquire highly sought defenseman Jakob Chychrun from the Ottawa Senators.

Penguins fans may soon find Washington to be an unrecognizable team. Gone is Nick Backstrom, and most likely gone is T.J. Oshie, both to injury-forced retirement and age. Defenseman John Carlson has battled significant injuries for a couple of seasons, and Alex Ovechkin is hanging on for his pursuit of Wayne Gretzky’s goals record, but his nearly full gray head of hair and declining play indicates the clock is ticking down loudly.

In a city with a residence contested by a pair of octagenarians, the team is undergoing a renaissance.

This offseason, Washington took a hefty gamble on talented 26-year-old center Piere-Luc Dubois, whom the LA Kings signed to an eight-year deal last summer but were ready to cut bait by this summer because of attitude and performance issues. Washington swapped bad salary in the deal by trading fading goalie Darcy Kuemper to LA, but it’s a long-term gamble, nonetheless.

The Capitals’ big move was getting Chychrun out of Ottawa for Nick Jensen and a third-rounder. Ottawa had to spend a pair of second-round picks plus more to get Chychrun out of Arizona, whose asking price was long reported to be a pair of first-round picks.

It was a steal for Washington.

Washington will further try to defend the steps on the National Portrait Gallery with a big upgrade in goal–Logan Thompson from Vegas. Washington also added scoring winger Andrew Mangiapane, grinder Taylor Raddysh, and rock-ribbed defenseman Matt Roy.

As long as Dubois doesn’t crater, it’s been a homerun offseason.

Oh, and Washington finished ahead of the Penguins last season, returning to the Stanley Cup Playoffs after a one-year absence.

Just two years ago, the Penguins and Capitals were the two oldest teams in the NHL, and the Penguins were the oldest team in North American pro sports (or amateur, for that matter, unless you counted the Senior Olympics).

Washington’s average age had dropped one year by the start of last season. Despite Tom Wilson and Ovechkin rolling another mile on their odometer, it should be even lower this season.

The Penguins are getting there. Eventually.

McClellan was promoted to president of hockey operations, so new Washington GM Chris Patrick will continue the move back toward contender status and toward players born after Nirvana splashed into the mainstream and “Cheers” went off the air.

Dubas has promised the same, and the biggest offseason addition may very well be new vice president of player personnel Wes Clark, whose draft classes were a cut above with the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Just look at the potential Capitals lines at forward for a direct comparison:

Alex Ovechkin-Dylan Strome-Tom Wilson

Connor McMichael–Pierre-Luc Dubois–Andrew Mangiapane

Sonny Milano-Hendrix Lapierre-Taylor Raddysh

Brandon Duhaime-Nic Dowd–Aliaksei Protas

Those lines are better than Washington iced last season. Patrick currently has about $1 million in salary cap space, but that’s factoring the LTIR of Backstrom and Oshie. It could fluctuate a bit before the season.

But if it’s an offseason battle to gain in the Metro, the Capitals are winning this battle.