WILSON OFFERS CAPS ‘SCARY’ EDGE
Bruising forward can do almost anything for the defending Stanley Cup champions
White boxing-style tape was wrapped tightly around Tom Wilson’s wrists as he picked at the reddish scabs that had formed on the knuckles of his right hand.
They looked somewhat fresh, but Wilson insisted they had been there for a while. At least two or three weeks, he said. Maybe even since the start of the season.
“They never heal,” said the Washington Capitals forward.
They never heal because Wilson doesn’t allow them to. Heading into Thursday’s game against the Toronto Maple Leafs, Wilson had fought five times this season — second most in the league — with the latest one coming Feb. 7, when he pummelled Colorado’s Ian Cole following a blindside hit on teammate Evgeny Kuznetsov.
Maybe that’s why Leafs head coach Mike Babcock called the six-foot-four and 218-pound Wilson “scary.” And maybe that’s why so many teams had now placed “toughness” at the top of their wish list heading into Monday’s trade deadline.
Whether it’s Philadelphia’s Wayne Simmonds, Carolina’s Micheal Ferland or Kevin Hayes of the New York Rangers, everyone is on the lookout for a version of Wilson: a top-six forward who can score, hit and drop the gloves. After all, it led to a Stanley Cup for the Capitals.
“Teams look at a team that won the year prior and try to look at why they had success,” said Wilson. “Obviously, the game is trending away from the physicality it has been in the past, but that being said, come playoff time it’s hard-nosed hockey. It’s right back to the hockey that we love, so it helps to have a team that’s well-balanced and can play a variety of different games.”
It certainly helped on Thursday night. Playing against his hometown team, Wilson had a short-handed goal and picked up an assist in the 3-2 win against Leafs. Along the way, the Toronto native delivered big hits on John Tavares, Jake Gardiner and pretty much anyone in blue.
The Leafs had no answer for him. Few teams have this season.
The way that the Capitals play is unique. They’re skilled, but they’re also scary. Alex Ovechkin, who leads the league with 42 goals, is not just a sniper. He’s also a 235-pound wrecking ball who last year changed the momentum of the conference final with some of his hits.
Wilson, who plays on the top line with Ovechkin and Evgeny Kuznetsov, is the opposite. First and foremost, he’s a physical presence. But with 16 goals this season, he can also finish scoring plays just as easily as he can bodychecks as he showed when he beat Frederik Andersen with a wrist shot for the eventual game-winner early in the third period.
“He’s a good player. He’s a first-rounder,” Kuznetsov said of Wilson, the 16th-overall pick in 2012 who spent the first four years of his career typecast as a bottom-six grinder before scoring 14 goals and 35 points last season.
“No one told him to make passes, to make plays. But after a couple of months of playing (on the top line), he started to make the passes and everything. And then everyone started talking, ‘Oh, he’s skilled.’ But he’s always skilled. It’s just about what the coach is asking of you. If he’s asking you to dump the puck all the time, then people aren’t going to see that you have that in your arsenal.”
Toronto’s Zach Hyman has fought twice this season and won both, but the six-foot-one, 209-pound winger will never be confused with Wilson. And yet the role he fulfils on a line with Mitch Marner and John Tavares is pretty much the same as the one Wilson plays in Washington, minus the intimidation factor.
“I don’t think there’s one guy in the league that gets the puck back more than him,” Babcock said of Hyman.
“Now, does he scare you like Tom Wilson? I don’t think so. But he comes to get you. He gets the puck.”
For the Leafs, that might be enough.
Hyman, who has delivered a team-leading 83 hits among forwards, is physical. But he’s also sacrificial, ranking ninth among NHL forwards in hits received. That’s fine. He’ll gladly be the first on the forecheck and take one for the team if it means Marner and Tavares are able to get the puck and get goals, while remaining healthy.
“Listen, I know what my role is on the line,” said Hyman, who has 11 goals in 49 games this season. “Just going into the corners and getting the puck, I’d rather get hit than have those other guys get hit.”
Not every team uses the same forward scheme as Toronto or Washington. In places such as Boston, Calgary, Colorado and Winnipeg, the top line features nothing but all-star-level talent. That, on its own, can be scarier than having Wilson breathing down your neck on the forecheck. But it can also be problematic, given that there’s only one puck to go around.
“Pavel (Datsyuk) used to tell me that he didn’t want two other guys on the line that wanted the puck,” said Babcock. “He just wanted someone to get him the puck. He wanted the puck all the time. So that’s what those guys (Hyman and Wilson) do. They get it for you and then go to the net … Good players don’t want players close to them. They want space. That’s why that works.”