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Trotz feels Caps are a ‘piece or two’ away at forward

Washington Capitals v New Jersey Devils

Barry Trotz

NHLI via Getty Images

Barry Trotz thinks his Washington Capitals can be a “playoff team that wins.” But at the same time, the coach believes his squad still needs a “piece or two” to really be successful in the postseason.

“I think we have enough pieces to be a real good threat, but our depth hasn’t been really tested to this point,” Trotz said, per CSN Washington.

“That’s why we need to have our young guys continue to develop and you need to have depth in the organization. I think we’re pretty deep on defense as an organization. …but at forward we could use a little more and that’s just waiting for guys like [Andre] Burakovsky, [Tom] Wilson and [Evgeny] Kuznetsov to develop.”

Hence, the reason we listed the Caps as a potential landing spot for Ryan O’Reilly, and also why we speculated about the potential for them to acquire Antoine Vermette from Arizona.

That said, it may be that Washington just has to stay patient with what it’s got. Kuznetsov is only 22, Burakovsky just 19. Learning how to play center in the NHL isn’t easy, and those two have yet to play 100 games combined.

The Caps, losers of two straight, host the Oilers Tuesday.