When Spencer Carbery was announced the new Washington Capitals head coach this past offseason, forward Connor McMichael knew this would be his chance at playing regularly in the NHL.
While the 2019 first round pick has had plenty of success in the AHL, McMichael had no points in six NHL games last season, and 18 in the previous. But with a familiar coach and an impressive training camp, he has finally found a consistent spot in the lineup with the Caps this season.
While shorthanded in Friday’s game against Minnesota, McMichael had a dazzling cross-ice feed to Tom Wilson, who rifled a shot past Wild goalie Marc-Andre Fleury that tied the game at one, before the Caps won in a shootout, 3-2.
“That was a high level play by him,” Wilson said, adding that McMichael looks more comfortable than in his previous NHL stints.
“He’s got a bit of swagger going on with his game,” Wilson said. “When he’s playing confident, you see him making those plays. Taking the puck into his own hands. Believing in himself and his talent level, which is elite. When you have a guy with that much skill start making those plays at this level, it’s pretty good to see.”
For Carbery, having McMichael playing on the PK shows a sign of willingness to do what it takes to play in the NHL.
“It’s going to be an important part of his role moving forward,” Carbery said. “Being able to contribute offensively, probably at some point in his career find time on the power play and he’ll want to thrive in that situation too, but he also needs to be good at the other end. He’s embraced that role.”
The assist was McMichael’s third point of the season and came a game after he scored the game-winning goal in New Jersey.
“He’s way more confident, comfortable, I’ve talked about it a bunch, he’s making way more plays,” Carbery said. “We were talking about it as a staff today, you could argue if you just look at the scoring chances in the seven games, he’s had 12 ‘Grade-A’ [chances]. ‘Grade-A’. Him and the goaltender. We were joking around that he potentially could have six, seven, eight goals.”
With 74 games left in the season, if the Caps want to return the playoffs, they will need McMichael to continue to be effective at both ends of the ice.
