Don’t worry, Capitals fans, Tom Wilson’s face is going to be okay after he took a puck to the chops on Saturday night, and he ‘should be good to go’ for Thursday’s game in Columbus.
But still, a scary moment to see Wilson get hit by friendly fire from teammate Jakub Chychrun…even as we saw Willie score twice AFTER taking the shot!
“Chicky’s shot gets deflected, it goes off of their defender's stick, so that’s why it went to a weird spot. Sometimes people ask me how does that not happen more often, but when players usually shoot the puck, they know when there's traffic around and they're trying to find it through,” Carbery said. “They very rarely shoot it that high, and where sometimes it goes haywire is when it goes off of something and tips, and that's what happened in that situation. It tipped off the defender’s stick, so now it gets up high and that's where Willie was going across in that front and then catches him.”
Carbery didn’t expect Wilson to return in the game, so he immediately got to work trying to figure out how to move forward without him – but no matter what, you have to assume that anyway, or else you’ll be on edge as a coach.
“In that moment, what I'm thinking is he gets hit, he comes back, you can tell this is not good, and that’s usually good night for that player,” Carbs said. “You're always hoping and you're optimistic, but as a coach, I have to figure out adjustments on the fly, because if you just sit there like ‘where's Willie,’ you're gonna miss the next line change, and now all of a sudden we're down a forward. So I gotta move people around, and I started to move the lines around and make alternative alternate plans, but when he came flying back out, our trainer said he was good to go and play, so he went right back in there – and what a credit.”
A credit because guys come back from cuts or dings or whatever a lot…but a broken sinus cavity?
“Guys get nicked up and they come back in; that’s our sport, and usually, guys are gonna do everything they possibly can and usually it's the trainers who hold them out,” Carbs said. “But for him, what he was going through, I can’t imagine how bad his face was throbbing and the pressure. And to perform like that in the third, not just the goals but what he did to have a positive impact was just incredible. He basically dragged us back into that game.”
Take a listen to Carbery’s entire visit above, as he also discussed the Caps’ strong road record, how the team is bouncing back from adversity, how well the entire organization is performing, and more!