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Washington Capitals Bringing Back Black “Screaming Eagle” Uniform for 2024-25 NHL Season

Back in August, we reported the Washington Capitals might be bringing back the “Screaming Eagle” uniform for the 2024-25 season, and this morning, the Capitals have made it official.

The Capitals will wear their special black screaming eagle unis for six games during the upcoming regular season — which also marks the franchise’s 50th anniversary.

According to the team

To commemorate the Washington Capitals 50th Anniversary, the Capitals will wear their special black screaming eagle jersey for six home games during the 2024-25 season. The jersey features a blue, black, and bronze color scheme, with the Capitol Building displayed on the shoulder. The design is reminiscent of the Capitals’ jersey, first introduced in 1995.

It combines their first-ever third jersey and the original rebrand. The screaming eagle preying in the downward design direction is meant to evoke an eagle’s energy, power, and speed, chosen for its symbolic status as the national bird of the United States. The shoulder patch includes the Capitol building in front of two crossed hockey sticks. The logo was completed with two stars in the background and a hockey puck nested between the blades of the sticks.

And of course, their announcement was paired with a video featuring Alex Ovechkin, who received the jersey news as a birthday present:

The team even recreated an almost 20-year old photo of Ovi wearing the original black alternate uniform in 2005 (note the throwback shoulder patch was the original crest; the screaming eagle was worn on the blue and white sweaters).

Here’s a closeup of the shoulder patch:

And the crest:

These are the six dates during which the Screaming Eagle will be worn: Wednesday, Nov. 6th vs. Nashville Predators; Friday, Nov. 29th vs. New York Islanders; Tuesday, Dec. 31st vs. Boston Bruins; Saturday, Jan. 18th vs. Pittsburgh Penguins; Saturday, Feb. 1st vs. Winnipeg Jets; and, Sunday, April 13th vs. Columbus Blue Jackets.

As I wrote back in August, “I never liked the Capitals when they veered from their original red, white and blue branding, which lasted from 1995 through 2007. The whole tealish-blue, black and bronze with the asymmetrical designs never looked right to my eye. But I know some people loved it, and those were the franchise colors when Ovi debuted, so reviving the RR design to celebrate the 50th Anniversary isn’t a total stretch.”

Your thoughts?

 
  
 
Comments (23)

    I like the design in general, but I do wonder what it would look like in the Caps more traditional colors.

    This design is loved locally, myself included. Bringing it back for only six games feels like a good compromise for those that dislike the color scheme/logo and those that love it.

    For me, 6/82 games may not be enough!

    Its nice enough to see it again, but they literally wore this two seasons ago so it doesn’t feel like that much of an event. For a 50th celebration I would have been more interested to see a return of an actual jersey design they wore regularly like the Blue or White Screaming Eagle, or Ovis original first jersey with the Capital logo on black.

    I would just as soon never see the black uniforms again. It reminds me of lots of bad hockey – the Jagr trade, battling for 29th place with Pittsburgh, etc. I don’t like the color scheme either

    In that 2005 photo, Ovechkin is not wearing a screaming eagle jersey.

    I think these are terrible. Aside from the supersized ad, the number font and the sash on the back look awful. The sash on front with the Capitals wordmark looks less-bad, but it seems unneccessary.

    I like the colors, other than the fact that the Caps are a RW&B team.

    It’s more of a mashup of that eras jerseys. The black with the gaudy capitol logo was the alternate, with blue and white being the primaries.

    At the time, the white screaming eagle jersey was the road jersey, and the blue jersey had been retired (while still the road jersey) in favor of the black Capitol Building jersey which had been their third previously.

    It’s weird that the sweater Ovi is wearing in the schedule graphic is different in several places – the bottom stripe is black rather than blue, no red in the eagle’s mouth, different collar style.

    These are from the era I became a Caps fan and I never liked these, other than the actual eagle logo. And even that has been improved with the “weagle” they have now. Just use that as the primary logo instead of the word mark, and they’d have a nice set.

    I believe it’s the same jersey. I just think the blue looks black because of the poor quality of the calendar photo. Same with the collar.

    This wasn’t an actual jersey/uniform design during the original run, right? They had the teal jersey, and a black w/ the capitol. But black w/ the eagle was a reverse retro or something? Seems like an odd choice to throw back to… 2022

    The blue that the Caps wore from 1995-2007 wasn’t really a teal-ish blue. It was more of a steel blue or process blue, similar to the shade that the Colorado Avalanche wear. Compare: (link) and (link).

    In any regard, I have a soft spot in my heart for those uniforms because the Caps switched to them when I lived in the DC area and I saw several of their games when they were in those duds (including a couple of playoff tilts during their run to the Stanley Cup Final in 1998. I’m not saying it’s a better look than their classic red, white, and blue uniforms, but I think it has its place.

    My only complaint is that I wish they’d brought back the blue or white version of this jersey. The black one wasn’t worn during the uniform set’s original run. It was part of the Reverse Retro program a couple of years ago. It was fine for that promotion, but I don’t feel like the design elements pop as much on the black background as they do on white or blue.

    Their regular uniforms are so bad that I actually don’t mind this. But they should make the 70s throwbacks the full time look.

    Glad to see that old RR uniforms can make a comeback. There were many great RR in the NHL that were gone too soon and would make great regular alternates (or in some cases great new primary uniforms) if they were revived.

    Nice change for a few games. The people complaining are redic. It’s just 6 games. Enjoy the change.

    They should make the ad extra special like those inscriptions on the inside collar, and put the ad inside the jersey where only a select few will be able to gaze upon it.

    I’d love it if they just switched to the RWB version of this full-time. Their current unis are probably bottom 5 in the league now.

    I like it. Prefer it over the red, white and blue stuff, honestly. I don’t think that just because a team is based in DC they must use that color scheme. I think that’s a lazy approach, in my opinion. Get creative. Teal, black and bronze is an awesome color combination.

    First Sacramento, now this. Are we headed back to the garish 90s era of extremely cartoony designs?

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