Having been here for most of eight years, Brooks Laich remembers the Capitals being so bad that players used to look up at the empty stands from their home ice and joke, “It must be Dress Up Like a Seat Night.”
When Alex Ovechkin set the NHL afire about five years ago and was eventually paired with great, young talent and experienced grinders, the rush of becoming a Stanley Cup contender was so much more exhilarating for Laich than, say, for a veteran on a middling team — because he knew how much work and time it took to go from lousy to the most electrifying team in hockey.
Now? He just doesn’t want to leave with the same lament his former coach had.
More...
