Hot Start in DC for Hitchcock & Caps

We're 10 games into the season and you can already see trends starting to form around the league like the Habs scoring goals at will or the Blues goaltending leaking like a sieve. One trend that's helping fans show up in record numbers on capital hill is Washington's .800 Winning %. The team has sold out every home game so far this season and are sitting atop the leagues power rankings. What's the big change from last year to this year you might ask? Well one of the biggest changes made by management was bringing in veteran head coach and proven winner Ken Hitchcock to a rich two year deal. Hitchcock has shown early why he should be one of the highest paid in the EHE. We sat down with the Capitals bench boss for a chat today, you can see the transcript below:

Q: "Welcome Ken, Thanks for being here. Can you walk us through what made you choose Washington in the off-season?"

Ken Hitchcock: "Thanks for having me. I had a few options available but GM Mitchell and the Capitals made me a substancial offer and were serious about taking this team to that next level. So that made this decision quite easy for me."

Q: "How do you feel about the roster make-up of this team? Are you being given a say in roster moves?"

KH: "I was impressed with the forward group and the world class goaltending already on the roster, obviously the team was looking thin on the back end and that's the area I told the GM needed the most improvement. Bringing in Marc Staal helped a great deal as well as Beauchemin, those are guys that can eat minutes and really rounded us out back there. Yeah, I am being given a voice here but we handle things by committee and I trust that the decisions being made are in the best interest of the team."

Q: "You mentioned taking this team to the next level, what does that entail?"

KH: "I think the main thing this team was lacking was proper structure. Willie Desjardins is a good friend but he was lacking discipline and accountability with this group. We've been paying closer attention to the advanced stats and we are trying to play a better possession game. The guys have responded well I think and it's showing in their confidence out there game in and game out."

Q: "Despite the teams play so far this season the second line is collectively a minus. Can we expect any changes to the line-up?"

KH: "We've tried a few things in practice but I've been hesitant to make a change come game time. I know that's a bit uncharacteristic of me but it's been hard to separate the other lines the way they've been playing together. When the time is right there may be a change coming, we'll see."

Q: "Who's the standout player so far this season that you've seen? Maybe someone is playing above where you thought they were?"

KH: "Well our standout has been Anze Kopitar so far this year but I guess you could say that's expected of him being our first line center and a world class player. He does so many things for us out there and he's doing a lot more than just providing offense. As for who is playing better than expected, I've really liked what I've seen so far from Vasilevskiy. He's playing behind one of the best goalies in the league and arguably looking better so far. I think he's been helping push Lu to be a better goalie to so he doesn't lose any starts to him."

Q: "Are you worried about what this team will look like after the expansion draft?"

KH: "Well that's up to our GM. We've talked internally about this and have come up with a plan but we have so many free agents on this team that I don't feel we'll be hurt to badly from it. Again this is a better conversation to have with our GM."

Expected line-up for Thursday night's game against the Rangers:

Ondrej Palat - Anze Kopitar - Loui Eriksson

Anders Lee - Martin Hanzal - Radim Vrbata

Benoit Pouliot - Sean Couturier - Alex Burmistrov

Tobias Rieder - Brian Boyle - Jonathan Marchessault

Francois Beauchemin - Justin Faulk

Marc Staal - Aaron Ekblad

Clayton Stoner - Zbynyk Michalek

Roberto Luongo