Honestly, I almost skipped hockey this year. My streaming budget is already stretched across football and basketball, and the NHL has a way of scattering its games across more apps than I have patience for. Then Alex Ovechkin said this season would be his last, and my careful little budget went out the window.

I'm Dana, I watch too many sports, and I refuse to pay for cable. So here is my take: if there was ever a season to sort out your Capitals viewing, it's this one. You do not need a cable box to do it, but you do need to know which of two kinds of fan you are, because the answer is completely different for each.

The only question that matters: where do you live?

Hockey streaming makes sense once you accept one annoying truth. Most of a team's games are local broadcasts, and local broadcasts are locked to the team's home region. A handful of games each season get picked up nationally. Everything about what you should buy follows from that.

If you live in the DC area (DC, Maryland, Virginia and the surrounding Capitals territory), most games air on Monumental Sports Network, the regional channel owned by the same group that owns the team. The good news for cable-haters like me is that you can subscribe to it directly. The Monumental+ app sells the channel as a standalone stream, typically around $20 a month, with an annual plan that works out cheaper. No bundle and no contract. Check the Monumental site for the current price and to confirm your zip code is in territory before you pay.

This is the option I'd pick if I lived inside the Beltway. A direct subscription that covers the bulk of 82 games for roughly the price of a couple of arena beers is about as fair as sports streaming gets. The app is not the slickest thing I've ever used, but it shows the games, and that's all I'm asking of it.

If you'd rather have a full live TV bundle, Monumental has been carried on some of the big ones, including DirecTV's streaming packages. Regional sports carriage changes constantly, though, and I've been burned before by assuming. Check the channel lineup for your zip code on the service's official site before you commit. A bundle runs $80 or more a month, so it only makes sense if you want the other 100 channels too.

If you live anywhere else, you're an out-of-market fan, and your world is simpler. Out-of-market NHL games stream through ESPN's app. The package covers more than a thousand out-of-market games a season and comes with the ESPN streaming plans, either ESPN Select at around $13 a month or the bigger ESPN Unlimited at around $30. For someone in Ohio or Oregon who wants to watch nearly every Capitals game, Select is the bargain of the whole sport.

The catch is blackouts. If the Caps play your local team, that game is blacked out on the out-of-market package, and nationally televised games are handled separately too. For most people that's a handful of nights a year, not a dealbreaker.

The national games, which are scattered as usual

Beyond the local broadcasts, the NHL's national games in the US are split between two media families, and a farewell season is the kind of thing national TV loves to schedule. Expect the Capitals to show up there more than a typical team would.

The ESPN side includes games on ESPN and ABC, plus some that stream exclusively on ESPN's app and Hulu. If you already have ESPN Select or Unlimited for the out-of-market games, you're mostly covered. The ABC games are a nice bonus for the budget crowd, because ABC is free with an antenna. I keep a $25 indoor antenna stuck to my window for exactly this kind of thing, and it has paid for itself many times over.

The other side is TNT. Its games air on TNT and sometimes truTV, and they also stream on HBO Max. If you don't have a bundle with TNT, an HBO Max subscription is the cable-free route. Plans start around $11 a month with ads and go up from there, but check the official site to see which tiers currently include live sports, because that has shifted over time.

So a cord-cutter can assemble the whole thing without a cable company involved:

  • In-market: Monumental+ for the local games, an antenna for ABC, and ESPN and HBO Max as needed for the national nights.
  • Out-of-market: ESPN Select for nearly everything, an antenna for ABC, and HBO Max for the TNT games.

My opinion, for what it's worth, is that you shouldn't subscribe to everything in October and forget about it. I rotate. I keep the core service all season and add HBO Max only for a month when there's a TNT game I care about. These are all month-to-month, so cancel freely.

What about a full live TV bundle?

I'll be fair to the bundles, even though I rarely recommend them. If your household also watches the NFL, college football and the NBA, a service like YouTube TV, Hulu + Live TV, Fubo or DirecTV's streaming plans can replace a pile of separate apps. They generally run $80 to $95 a month and include ESPN and ABC, usually with TNT in the mix. Check each lineup, because channel disputes can make things vanish overnight.

Sling is the budget version. Its Orange plan has ESPN and TNT for around $46 a month, though it does not carry the Capitals' regional channel, so it suits out-of-market fans who only want the national games.

But for Ovechkin alone, a bundle is overkill. The direct options are cheaper and cover more games.

Time-sensitive: the farewell season itself

This is the part of the article that will age, so I'm keeping it in one place. As of early October 2026, Ovechkin has announced that this NHL season will be his last. A few things follow from that:

  • Expect schedule changes. Networks tend to move marquee games into national windows as a season develops. A game listed on Monumental today could end up on ESPN or TNT later, so check the Capitals' official schedule the week of any game you care about.
  • The final home games will be the hot ticket. They will also be the likeliest to get national treatment, which can mean a different app than you've used all season. Don't find that out at puck drop.
  • Playoffs are a separate deal. If Washington makes it, postseason games move to the national partners, with early rounds sometimes shared with the regional channel. The ESPN and TNT options above are what you'd need.

My bottom line

I'm not a Capitals fan by birth, and I'm still going to watch a lot of this. A player who rewrote the goal-scoring record book is taking one last lap, and that's worth $13 to $20 a month to me. The NHL's streaming setup deserves plenty of grumbling, but once you know whether you're in-market or out, the answer is one main subscription and an antenna.

Pick your side of the map, pay month to month, and cancel when the season ends.

See you at puck drop. — Dana

— Dana Whitfield