Washington Capitals coach Spencer Carbery fumbled his words as he discussed new linemates Ilya and Aliaksei Protas.<\/p>\n
The Capitals called up their AHL star, 19-year-old Ilya, on Monday, which Carbery said is great and exciting. But it also presents him with a unique challenge: How do you differentiate between the two in the heat of the moment?<\/p>\n
Discussing it with the brothers from Belarus, Carbery briefly considered the nicknames \u201cPro\u201d and \u201cLil Pro,\u201d but he tossed that idea out because \u201clil\u201d is a bit too difficult to yell from the bench, especially when they are playing on the same line. Instead, they settled on \u201cPro\u201d for Ilya and \u201cBig Pro\u201d for Aliaksei.<\/p>\n
Aliaksei is, after all, Ilya\u2019s big brother by five years, although reporters watching Ilya\u2019s first practice with the team Tuesday questioned if the little brother might have passed his big brother in height.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope not,\u201d Aliaksei replied adamantly when asked. Carbery said he\u2019d need to see the two back-to-back, but Ilya conceded his big brother is still taller.<\/p>\n
Both are officially listed at 6-foot-6. Together with 6-foot-4 Tom Wilson, they presented an intimidating line at Tuesday\u2019s practice.<\/p>\n
Carbery explained that he decided to put the brothers together to ease Ilya\u2019s transition into the NHL.<\/p>\n
\u201cBasically trying to make him as comfortable as possible and give us some balance through three lines. … I think the insulation, and him being able to communicate with his brother, and his brother helping him through and also Wilson,\u201d Carbery said.<\/p>\n
At the AHL level, Ilya showed that he\u2019s a 200-foot player who\u2019s intelligent and a good skater despite his size. Carbery said he\u2019s excited to see if Ilya\u2019s skill around the net, ability to make small plays, and offensive talent at both full strength and on the power play will translate to the NHL.<\/p>\n
Starting out between two 30-goal-scorers last season in Wilson and his brother is nerve-racking, Ilya said. While Aliaksei joked that Ilya needs to be crisper with his passes, he said he doesn\u2019t think Ilya really needs his help.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t skate for him, I didn\u2019t do the gym for him, right?\u201d Aliaksei said. \u201cHe\u2019s done it himself. He\u2019s a hard-working guy. He absolutely deserves it. Did I help him? Yes. I tried my best. I\u2019m excited for him. But he did it by himself.\u201d<\/p>\n
As proud as he is of his little brother, Aliaksei didn\u2019t expect Ilya to take off quite as fast as he did in the AHL. As Carbery pointed out, even Aliaksei took some time to be a top scorer in the AHL. Ilya had 62 points in 66 games before being promoted.<\/p>\n
The game before Ilya was called up, he scored six points for the Hershey Bears. Aliaksei had scored two points for the Capitals. He felt good about that until he saw his younger brother\u2019s stat line, he joked.<\/p>\n
The brothers talk every day, sometimes about hockey, but often over FaceTime so Ilya can talk to Aliaksei\u2019s daughter, whom he had only seen in-person once.<\/p>\n
But when Ilya called with the news of his call-up, Aliaksei didn\u2019t answer. He was busy with his daughter. Ilya followed it with a text. Aliaksei immediately picked up the phone after that.<\/p>\n
Although he joked that he made his brother stay in a hotel, in reality, Aliaksei offered his brother his guest room. The Capitals only have four regular season games left, so it wouldn\u2019t make sense for Ilya to find his own place. Plus, Ilya will get to spend more time (and maybe help out) with his niece. <\/p>\n
Ilya will make his debut Wednesday in Toronto, and he\u2019ll get to do it with his brother by his side.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s just unbelievable,\u201d Ilya said. \u201cI couldn\u2019t believe for a second. I was so shaky for a bit. It was special, for sure. I can\u2019t describe it, and I can\u2019t wait for tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Washington Capitals coach Spencer Carbery fumbled his words as he discussed new linemates Ilya and Aliaksei Protas. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":547027,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5114],"tags":[9929,6034,12911,191,5,2082,4,12913,190,109,5222],"class_list":{"0":"post-547026","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-washington-capitals","8":"tag-american-league","9":"tag-baseball","10":"tag-bestof","11":"tag-capitals","12":"tag-hockey","13":"tag-national-league","14":"tag-nhl","15":"tag-topix","16":"tag-washington","17":"tag-washington-capitals","18":"tag-washingtoncapitals"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116368099643825631","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=547026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547026\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/547027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=547026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=547026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=547026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}