Nic Dowd celebrated his son’s birthday on New Year’s Eve, then went out in a matinee and helped his Caps to a 3-1 win over the Bruins – and then the squad had a little party at a DC restaurant where they celebrated the start to the season and the start of a New Year.
So you can forgive Dowder for being a couple minutes late Thursday for his first visit of 2025 with the Junkies, but suffice to say, after a holiday break followed by three games (and two wins) in four days, it’s just another season for Dowd.
“It’s taxing, but I feel like at this point in my career, I just grind it out in the middle of the days between the games, and then rev it up for 7 p.m.,” Dowd said. “It’s challenging to play three in four, especially coming off a holiday break where, you know, we're all enjoying ourselves and probably staying up a little late and maybe having an extra glass of wine and eating good food. To come right off break and you got to refocus and you play three really good hockey teams…at any point in the season when you play three in four, it’s really hard, but to do it after that break is tough.”
And a painful end to that, as Dowd and the Caps blocked 28 shots in front of Logan Thompson in Tuesday’s win, which is a lot of ouchies.
“What it comes down to is the fear of not blocking it, and appearing as if you don't want to block it, I think is worse than getting hit with it. From a teammate standpoint, you never want to be that guy who people are like, well, that guy definitely didn't want to block that shot and had no interest in doing it, because the rest of us are doing it,” Dowd said. “That's why you see a guy like Ovi, the best players in the league, still blocking shots. Hockey has a culture of not putting anybody on a pedestal, and the culture of it amongst teammates is guys expect everyone to do the little things and the tough things. The farther you are away from the shot, the harder it hurts, right? So if you're right next to the guy shooting it, and he shoots it immediately, that's the slowest that puck's gonna be coming right off his stick, so it probably hurts a little less and you probably have a better chance of not getting hit somewhere up high. But I feel bad for some of the D-men that are trying to flex out to block a shot on a penalty kill and the guy's taking it from like 20 feet away, and it’s someone that has a missile and you don't quite know if they're shooting high. But it’s just something you gotta do, part of the game.”
Oh, and there was one other cool thing about the stretch after the holiday break: Ovi is back, and he scored a pair in his first game back!
“A lot of people probably don't realize it, but over his career, he hasn't missed a lot of time. I think this was one of his biggest injuries that he missed time with, so to keep him away from the game, I think he was pretty upset about that initially,” Dowd said. “And, he was pretty hot when he got hurt, and we were playing really well and he was contributing a lot. But it was great to see him kind of join the club again, and not only that, but continue to pick up right where he left off.”
Take a listen to Dowd’s entire visit, as he also discusses the young centers scoring well this year, the ebbs and flows of the season so far, and much more!