A year ago at this time, the Washington Capitals entered the 2007-2008 season seeking their first playoff berth in five years amidst a declaration by Owner Ted Leonsis that the team's rebuilding phase was over.

 

Twenty-one games in, it seemed Leonsis' statement was more than a bit hasty. After a 6-14-1 start that had the Caps in dead last in the league, General Manager George McPhee fired Head Coach Glen Hanlon on Thanksgiving Day and handed over the reigns to the coach of their AHL affiliate in Hershey, Bruce Boudreau.

The change sparked a remarkable turnaround in which the Caps earned 81 standings points in 61 games – including winning their last seven games of the regular season – to eke into the playoffs, earning the Southeast Division championship on the final day of the regular season.

Despite a first-round exit at the hands of the Philadelphia Flyers, Washington’s amazing run was recognized at the NHL Awards Ceremony at the end of the season.

Boudreau took home the Jack Adams Award for coach of the year and Nicklas Backstrom finished as the runner-up to Chicago’s Patrick Kane for the Calder Memorial Trophy, given to the league’s rookie of the year.

Then there was Alex Ovechkin.

In his third year in the NHL, the Russian superstar led the league in goals (65) and points (112). His astronomical goal total was 13 more than Atlanta’s Ilya Kovalchuk, who was his closest competitor with 52, and it broke a 26-year-old team record for goals in a season held by Dennis Maruk, who scored 60 for the Caps in 1981-1982.

Until Ovechkin last season, no one had broken the 60-goal barrier since Penguins legend Mario Lemieux scored 69 in 1995-1996.

Naturally, Ovechkin cleaned house at the Awards Ceremony, taking home the Hart Memorial Trophy as the NHL’s most valuable player, the Art Ross Trophy for the player who leads the league in points, the Maurice “Rocket” Richard Trophy as the league’s top goal scorer and the Lester B. Pearson Award as the league’s top player as voted on by other players. The Caps also rewarded Ovechkin in the middle of last season by inking him to the largest contract in NHL history: $124 million over 13 years.

Heading into 2008-2009, the Caps are faced with their highest expectations since 2001, when they added Jaromir Jagr to a team that had already won back-to-back Southeast Division titles. (And we all know how that turned out.)

The lineup on opening night on October 10 in Atlanta will be nearly identical to the one that faced the Flyers in the first round of the playoffs last season – a series that the Capitals lost in a devastating game seven after coming back from a 3-1 deficit in games.

On the surface, the biggest change is in net.

Last year's opening day starter, Olie Kolzig, has departed after seventeen years in Washington. The 38-year-old veteran goaltender's contract expired after last season and, embittered by General Manager George McPhee's lack of communication with him over his role on the team, left for division rival Tampa Bay.

Cristobal Huet, one of the heroes of the Capitals' '07-'08 stretch run, is also gone. The French goaltender, who won 11 of 13 starts with the Caps after being acquired from Montreal at the trade deadline for a 2009 second-round draft pick, spurned McPhee's three-year, $15 million offer to join the Chicago Blackhawks at four years, $22.5 million.

Enter Jose Theodore (that's Joe-Zay not Ho-Zay, and Theodore like the chipmunk).

The dreamboat (so I'm told...) 32-year-old had a rollercoaster three-season tenure in Colorado, where he struggled mightily for two seasons before regaining his form in 2007-2008.

And while the Huet-backers will decry the switch to Theodore as a downward move, the numbers don’t support that.

Before coming to Washington on February 26, Huet was 21-12-6 (1.23 standings points per game) with a 2.56 goals against average and a .916 save percentage with the East’s top team in Montreal.

Meanwhile, Theodore posted similar numbers in Colorado. Over the full season, he went 28-21-3 (1.13 standings points per game) with a 2.44 goals against average and a .910 save percentage, all with the West’s sixth-best team.

That’s not to say Theodore will post the superhero numbers that Huet did in his short Caps tenure (11-2-0, 1.63 GAA, .936 SV%), but even if he can match his own 2007-2008 numbers, Theodore will provide a vast improvement over the departed Kolzig’s 2.91 goals against average and .892 save percentage of last season.

Also, Theodore was able to accomplish one thing that Huet was not last season: A playoff series win. Theodore led the Avalanche to a first-round upset of the Minnesota Wild before getting swept by the eventual Stanley Cup Champion Red Wings.

On offense, Chris Clark and Michael Nylander appear to be healthy and ready for the season, making the Caps’ forward corps one of the deepest in the NHL.

With three elite centers in Backstrom, Nylander and Sergei Fedorov, 2008-2009 will be the first season in years that the Capitals can actually claim to be deep at pivot.

Backstrom is coming off an excellent rookie campaign in which he registered 69 points (14 goals, 55 assists) while helping Ovechkin lead the world in everything on offense. All this, and Backstrom won't even reach the legal drinking age until 20 games into this season.

Fedorov will take the second line center position, where he had success working with Alexander Semin late last season and in the playoffs. Fedorov currently needs 18 goals to reach 500 for his career, and while it's not out of reach, it doesn't seem likely given that he only scored 11 times in 68 games last season (and due to the possibility that he might see some action on defense, but more on that later). Age is also not in Fedorov's favor, as he will turn 39 in December, but despite his advancing years he is still a solid two-way player.

Nylander, 36, is coming off a season in which he was limited to just 40 games after suffering a torn left rotator cuff. He played through the injury for three weeks before deciding he couldn't take it anymore – and his numbers suffered for it. He skated to a career low minus-19 rating after being at or above even the seven previous seasons. He looked to be back to form in the preseason, scoring twice and adding four assists while skating to a plus-five rating over five games.

Defensive specialist Boyd Gordon (soon to be 25 years old) will likely occupy the fourth center spot, although David Steckel and Brooks Laich could both see time at that position as well.

The right side is obviously anchored by 23-year-old reigning NHL MVP Ovechkin, coming off the 65-goal, 112-point season in which he also accrued a plus-minus rating of plus-28, which shows his growing maturity as a two-way player.

Fellow Russian right wing Semin, 24, finished last season strong after struggling through a high ankle sprain early in the season that caused him to miss 15 of the first 19 games as the Caps got off to a dismal start. After netting eight points (three goals, five assists) against the Flyers in the playoffs, Semin went on to lead the gold-medal-winning Russian squad with 13 points (six goals, seven assists) at the 2008 IIHF World Championships in Canada.

If both stay healthy, it’s possible that the duo of Alexes could combine to approach triple digits in goals.

Enforcer Donald Brashear takes one of the right wing spots as he enters his third season as the Capitals’ enforcer. While his penalty minutes have dropped each of the last three seasons, even at 36 he’s still one of the game’s best pugilists and acts as a good deterrent to anyone who might attempt to take liberties with any of the Caps’ top six forwards.

The other right wing slot is one of the few positions that remains undecided as the regular season approaches. Both Tomas Fleischmann and Eric Fehr are natural right wings, and while they’ve switched sides to fill open left wing spots in the past, that may not be a viable option with Clark back in the lineup.

Fleischmann scuffled at times in 2007-2008, when he scored 10 goals and assisted on 20 others while putting together a minus-seven rating, but he was given a two-year extension worth $1.45 million in February. Despite the vote of confidence from the organization, the Czech winger’s lack of physical play led him to be a healthy scratch for the last five games of the playoff series against the Flyers.

Fehr was out most of last season with a mystery back ailment, but returned in early March and played 23 games with the Caps, scoring once and adding five helpers while skating to a plus-four rating.

In preseason, Fleischmann has seemingly taken control of the spot, scoring four goals and adding an assist in five preseason games while Fehr has had just one goal and one assist.

Fleischmann, 24, was drafted by Detroit in the second round in 2002 (63rd overall). Fehr, 23, was Washington’s first-round pick (18th overall) in 2003.

The left wings are locked in as Clark, Viktor Kozlov, Brooks Laich and Matt Bradley, although the order of the first three is not yet determined.

Clark, 32, is the team's captain and scored 30 goals while playing on a line with Ovechkin in 2006-2007, but was limited to just 18 games last season as he couldn't shake a lingering strained groin muscle. Kozlov, 33, took his place as Ovechkin's linemate and had his second straight season over 50 points, scoring 16 goals and adding 38 assists.

But it was Brooks Laich who had a breakout season in '07-'08, scoring 20 goals for the first time in his career while splitting time at all three forward positions and among all four forward lines.

The 25-year-old Saskatchewan native hadn't scored as many as 10 goals in a season before he found his groove last year with the Caps, making his presence felt by crashing the net and looking for deflections and loose rebounds. Whether or not the former sixth-round pick can establish himself as a perennial 20-goal scorer remains to be seen, but the possibility of spending significant time with Semin and Fedorov as linemates couldn't hurt.

With 30-year-old veteran leader Matt Bradley a given at right wing on the checking line, one of last season's feel-good stories, Quintin Laing, is the odd man out

The 29-year-old shot blocker extraordinaire spent most of seven seasons in the AHL before being called up as an injury replacement in late November last year. In his 39 games with Washington he provided a spark on the penalty kill and did yeoman's work on a line charged with the task of shutting down the opposition's top players. However, he was sent down to Hershey along with Chris Bourque on Monday. (Any team could have picked Laing up off waivers if they were willing to keep him on their NHL roster, but no one did.)

Chris Bourque, the 22-year-old son of Hall of Fame defenseman Ray Bourque, also pushed hard for one of the wing spots, scoring six points (three goals, three assists) in six games in the preseason. But he fell victim to a lack of space and was returned to Hershey, where he's scored 25 or more goals the past two seasons for the Bears.

On defense, Shaone Morrisonn, Mike Green, Tom Poti, Jeff Schultz, John Erskine and Milan Jurcina will be the regular six forwards, just like last season.

The biggest newsmaker is Green, the NHL's leading goal-scorer among defenseman last season, who was rewarded for his breakout year with a four-year contract worth $21 million. The soon-to-be 23-year-old was third on the team in points in '07-'08 with 56 (18 goals, 38 assists), trailing only Ovechkin and Backstrom. He also proved himself with a big shot from the point and a knack for scoring in overtime. Green's three overtime goals earned him the nickname "Game Over" with fans and media.

Green's success was a big part of the NHL's ninth-best power play, as eight of his 18 goals came with the man-advantage. The Caps will look for him to continue his offensive output while maturing as a defensive player. If he does, his contract will be considered a bargain.

Poti still has three years left on the four-year, $14 million contract he signed in the 2007 off-season, while Morrisonn, Schultz, Erskine and Jurcina are only signed through the upcoming season. (Brian Pothier still has two years left on his four-year, $10 million deal but it seems unlikely that he'll be able to play anytime soon as he still feels the effects of a concussion he suffered in January.)

The draft-day trade of 24-year-old Steve Eminger to the Flyers initially appeared to open the door for either Karl Alzner or Sami Lepisto to earn a spot.

Alzner, the fifth overall draft pick in 2007, was named the 2007-2008 Western Hockey League (one of the three major junior leagues in Canada) Player of the Year and Defenseman of the Year and was the captain of the Canadian national junior team that won gold in the 2008 World Junior Championships. But at just 20 years old a little time in the AHL could serve him well.

Lepisto, a soon-to-be 24-year-old Finnish defenseman who played serviceable defense for the Caps in seven games as an emergency call-up last season, also looked solid in preseason.

But the Caps threw everyone for a loop by deciding to keep only six regular defensemen and carrying one less than the maximum of 23 players on the roster, meaning both Lepisto and Alzner will start the season in Hershey.

So what happens if someone on defense gets hurt? Boudreau and the Caps seem to have answered that question by playing Fedorov on defense against Philadelphia in the next-to-last preseason game. The reviews were positive – as were the stats – as the veteran skated 17:30 to a plus-three rating and notched a pair of assists in a 5-1 win. (Fedorov also spent some time on defense with the Caps in the playoff series against Philadelphia last season, and he has been a blue-liner for short spells in Detroit and Columbus.)

With the roster set and the preseason over, there's nothing left to do but wait for the Caps to start the regular season on Friday, Oct. 10, against the Thrashers in Atlanta. The home-opener is on Saturday night, when they will face Cristobal Huet and the Chicago Blackhawks in front of what should be a raucous crowd at Verizon Center.

They will also raise the 2007-2008 Southeast Division Champions banner that night, which will serve as a symbol of last year's incredible revival – and this year's huge expectations.

Possible Line Combinations (lines change frequently throughout the season, but this is what you might see much of the time, at least early on):

Ovechkin – Backstrom - Kozlov
Semin – Fedorov – Laich
Fleischmann – Nylander – Clark
Brashear – Gordon – Bradley

Healthy Scratches: Fehr, Steckel

Defensive Pairings:

Morrisonn – Green
Erskine – Poti
Schultz – Jurcina

Goalies:

Theodore
Johnson

Be sure to also check out our season preview podcast, available at http://media.dcsportsbox.com/podcasts/capitals/feed.xml .