SCORE!

Alex Ovechkin, still going strong, overpowering at 600.

SCORM has tied it.

Cottyly fired, rebound doorstep, it's in!

Save Bade by Braden, Holby!

Oh my!

As Alex Chalk was robbed, the Washington Capitals by the 2018 Stanley Cup champions.

Well, hockey is back, although we are still awaiting the Washington Capitals,

who it feels like have not played a game in forever.

I'm Rob Carlin. This is a Capitals Talk podcast during the bye week. I'm here with Ryan Billy, as well as joined on the phone by Tom Gallidia of NHL.com, who covers the caps on a daily basis. So, Tom let's start with this. Talk caps fans off the ledge,

because with this seven-game losing streak, you would think the Stanley Cup never happened.

Fans are losing their minds. Why should they expect the caps to turn this around?

Well, I can understand them being concerned when you lose seven in a row. You never want to see a team do that no matter what you did the year before. But, you know, I think they're going to come around. You look at their team, and they're the same team that won last year, for the most part. But, you know, a couple of guys who've talked about that, you know, for a long time during the season. And I just feel like they kind of ran into a wall there in the end of January here. We're kind of got tired and maybe a little mentally tired. And they saw the break coming and as much as they wanted to try to kind of flip the switch the last few games, it was hard to do.

And we've seen it with teams, you know, like kind of, it's a very fine line. I think it's a reminder that it's a very fine line. You know, there's a team that was, you know, not giving up a lot of goals earlier in the season or last season at the end of the year. and then you've seen them giving up six and seven and an eight one time.

And if you're not playing the system the right way

and your attention to detail is not there, those are the things that can happen to you again, especially this year with the way teams are scoring more. And when you're the cup champs and every team is coming at you every night, you know, they're not going to have an off night. They're going to bring their best against you.

This is kind of a little reminder of that. But I do feel like this break is going to help them. They'll come back a little refreshed. And really, I guess the key is, you know, it's not going to be an easy game out of the gate playing against Calgary on Friday night. but, you know, they need to play better in that game

and kind of set their foundation again

and get started and forget but, you know, they need to play better in that game and kind of

set their foundation again and get started and forget about, I guess, what really happened

in those last seven games before the break.

You know, it's interesting because Billy has looked up numbers on past Stanley Cup champs,

...