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ARLINGTON, Va. — Charlie Lindgren received the text from his brother, Ryan Lindgren, not long after he got off the ice Tuesday night.
Charlie’s Washington Capitals had just clinched the second wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Eastern Conference with a 2-1 victory against the Philadelphia Flyers.
That set up a first-round series against Ryan’s New York Rangers,
“Nice job,” Ryan’s text said, according to Charlie. “Great job on the back-to-back. I’ll talk to you after Round One.”
Charlie replied, “Sounds good.”
And thus began the radio silence between Charlie, the Capitals starting goalie, and Ryan, a Rangers top-pair defenseman, that will last until the completion of the best-of-7 series. New York hosts Washington for Game 1 at Madison Square Garden on Sunday (3 p.m. ET; MNMT, ESPN, MSG, SN, TVAS).
“It’s obviously exciting,” Charlie said. “I have a lot of love for my brother, a lot of respect for the way he plays the game. My parents and my brother and my grandpa, everyone’s extremely excited. But I don’t want to lose focus. It’s not me vs. my brother. It’s the Capitals vs. the Rangers.”
The Lindgrens will be the 36th set of brothers to play at least one NHL playoff game against each other, according to NHL Stats & Information. This will be only the fourth instance of one of the brothers being a skater and the other a goalie, following Phil and goalie brother Tony Esposito (13 total games between the 1970 NHL Semifinals, 1974 NHL Semifinals and 1975 NHL Preliminary Round), Jean-Francois and Bob Sauve (two games in the 1984 Adams Division Semifinals) and Paul and Tiny Thompson (two games in the 1929 Stanley Cup Final).
“Obviously it’s a little weird,” Ryan said. “But I think once you get into it, you’re playing hockey and it’s playoffs. I’m excited. I’m sure he’s excited. It should be a good battle.”
Ryan said he and Charlie usually talk, “All the time. We’re really close.” During their communication blackout, the rest of their family will be caught in the middle.
Father Bob and brother Andrew plan to travel from Minnesota to attend the first two games in New York. Their mother, Jennifer, and 84-year-old grandfather, Ed Fleetham, will be at Games 3 and 4 in Washington.
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“It’s going to be a lot of fun,” Bob Lindgren said. “It can be nerve-wracking, for sure. … Somebody’s going to be bummed out when it’s over, but you just watch and have fun as best as you can because it ain’t easy.”
Charlie, 30, and Ryan, 26, played three games against each other during the regular season. Not knowing Charlie would start until the night before, none of the family made it to Washington when the brothers faced each other first time in the NHL on Dec. 9. Charlie made 31 saves in a 4-0 victory.
A large Lindgren contingent was there when Charlie played both ends of a home-and-home, in Washington on Jan. 13 (25 saves in a 3-2 Capitals win) and in New York on Jan. 14 (29 saves in a 2-1 Rangers win).
To Charlie’s relief, Ryan didn’t score (or have a point) in any of the three games.
“If he scored on me, that would probably be the death of me, I think,” Charlie said before the game Dec. 9.
Charlie’s thinking on that has not changed.
“That still stands,” he said.
Bob confirmed this is no exaggeration.
“When they were younger, he didn’t even like Ryan shooting on him or anything like that,” Bob said. “It was just something he didn’t want any part of.”
It took Charlie until about four years ago to give in and start skating with Ryan in the offseason.
“I was not going to let my younger brother have the opportunity to score on me,” he said.
The oldest of the three Lindgren brothers, Charlie followed in the goalie footsteps of his father, who played at the University of Michigan. Andrew, 27, also was a goalie, playing at St. John’s University in Minnesota before becoming a Minneapolis firefighter.
Ryan somehow missed the goalie gene.
“He wanted nothing to do with it,” Bob said. “I stuck him in there one time when he was really little, and the other coach had to peel him off the ice. … He just didn’t like it.”
Although Ryan is four years younger than Charlie, he established himself as a regular in the NHL first. After being selected by the Boston Bruins in the second round (No. 49) of the 2016 NHL Draft, his rights were traded to the Rangers in 2018 and he has 80 points (10 goals, 70 assists) in 333 regular-season games and eight points (three goals, five assist) in 27 playoff games during six NHL seasons.
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Game 1 against the Rangers will be Charlie’s first NHL playoff game. After signing with the Montreal Canadiens as undrafted free agent in 2016 following three seasons at St. Cloud State, he played in just 24 NHL games during five seasons with Montreal before signing a one-year contract with the St. Louis Blues in 2021.
Charlie spent most of the 2021-22 season with Springfield in the AHL but went 5-0-0 with a 1.22 goals-against average and .958 save percentage in five games with St. Louis. That led to three-year, $3.3 million contract with the Capitals in 2022, who signed him to back up Darcy Kuemper.
Charlie overtook Kuemper as Washington’s No 1 this season and established NHL career-highs in games (50), wins (25-16-7) and shutouts (tied for League-high with six) while compiling a 2.67 GAA and .911 save percentage.
“He’s paid his dues,” Bob said. “Things haven’t been easy for him and just to be able to kind of get the shot and run with it, I couldn’t be happier for him.”
While Charlie was driving the Capitals’ playoff push, going 12-6-2 with a 2.39 GAA, .919 save percentage and three shutouts while starting 19 of their final 22 games, Ryan supported his brother from a distance, well-aware the Rangers, the Presidents’ Trophy winners, might face him in the first round.
“You definitely knew it was a possibility in the last little while here with those four or five teams battling for it,” Ryan said. “The Capitals ended up playing really well toward the end there and were able to sneak in.”
Once the puck is dropped, Ryan and Charlie will be focused on playing, so the series likely will be more stressful for their parents. Bob acknowledged that it’s easier watching Ryan, though some of the painful shot blocks and hard hits he takes can be tough.
You might find the former goalie squirming in his seat when the puck is in the Capitals end, though.
“I get a little bit more wound up when Charlie is in there, sitting there, kicking out my leg trying to make a save or two,” Bob said.
Trying to avoid choosing sides, Bob said he’ll be rooting for a “low scoring” series.
“Ryan keeps asking me, ‘Who do you want to win?’ And it’s like, ‘I want you both to play well,'” he said. “At the end of the day, I tell him, ‘Ryan, how can I want somebody to score on your brother? How can I? I don’t. I can’t. Unless it’s you, how can I say that I want someone to score on him?’
“That’s not how I’m wired.”
