Why the Pressure Is on Capitals Players, Not Just Todd Reirden, to Avoid ‘changing of the Guard’

When you fall behind 3-0 in a first-round playoff series, you can bet a reckoning will come if you don't pull off a miraculous comeback.

This may be the reality the Capitals face after losing three straight to open their series against the Islanders. New York has executed their gameplan to perfection, the Caps are getting dominated in 5-on-5 situations and even though Alex Ovechkin still has hope for his club, there's a reason so few have come back from a 3-0 deficit.

While most of the blame has been put on head coach Todd Reirden, who's losing to Barry Trotz, the very man he replaced in Washington the year after the team won the Stanley Cup, play-by-play announcer Joe Beninati explained on The Sports Junkies Monday how the players have reason to feel the pressure too.

"It's not just Todd, it's the guys on the ice, too," Beninati said. "The pressure is on all of them, and they will all be graded and they will all be reviewed. This unfortunately feels like a changing of the guard to me, and that's not necessarily pointed at the coaching staff, there's a lot of players who will be graded harshly and be moved along from."

"Changing of the guard" is not typically something you want to hear about a professional sports team, mostly because it's preceded by a team coming up short and then succeeded by said team getting blown up more or less.

But to Beninati's point, the Caps aren't exactly a young team, and it's certainly played a role in their ability to generate chances against a stout Islanders defense.

"The other thing we're seeing, too, is that age is creeping up. It's a matter of, the Caps can play fast, they look like they play fast when their passing game on. But the Islanders seem to have a step on them, and the Islanders aren't an upper-echelon speed team."

If the Capitals get swept or ultimately bounced in the first round for the second straight year, is Reirden's job status a question? Will the Caps need to look at improving the roster and inject some young talent into the locker room? If you don't win it all, the answer to that question is most likely going to be yes.

That's just the reality of underperforming in the playoffs, especially for a team whose franchise player is in his mid-30's and it would behoove them to maximize his window as much as they can.

If the Caps can pull off a near miracle, great. They probably don't have to worry as much about these questions. But if not, and it seems likely given the way this series has played out, a "changing of the guard" doesn't appear to be off the table.

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