What an epic night for our lord and savior our captain number eight Aleksandr Mikhaylovich Ovechkin, but before I dive into this historic night I have to mention the ESPN coverage of this game.
How utterly embarrassing the commentary was, given the history that was happening. Chelios and Messier seemed to care less that a hockey game was happening with analysis like “they need to do a better job” wow great insight. They also just had mundane conversations throughout the game. For two of the all time greats of the game they have to be better. Also, I will give Steve Levy credit he tried his best to bring the energy with those two bringing him down. Ok back to the history!
On a late Tuesday night in the windy city history was made in typical Alex Ovechkin fashion by reaching the 800th goal mark on a hat trick. Alex now becomes one of 3 players in NHL history to score 800 goals the other two Howe and Gretzky.
Alex started the scoring off last night on a goal that wasn’t even seen on TV till the replay because ESPNs coverage was a joke last night.
Alex scored off a backhand pass deflection off a Blackhawks defender then whipped the puck five-hole to give the Caps a 1-0 lead and get goal number 798. This was also Ovi’s 136th career game-opening goal which passed Jaromir Jagr for the most in NHL history! Ovi also scored this goal just 24 seconds into the game for his 12th opening minute goal which ties Gordie Howe, Phil Esposito and Dave Taylor for third all-time behind only Sidney Crosby (14) and Mark Messier (13).
Alex’s first goal of the game also was his 66th time in his career that he started the scoring in a road game, which passed Brett Hull (65) for the most in league history as well.
Then not long after Alex camped just to the left of the Chicago goal to get an easy second goal of the night from a nice pass from Sheary. This goal gave the Capital’s a 2-0 lead and Ovi his 799th goal.
Then came 800 and the hat trick off some chaos in front with the Chicago goalie laying on his stomach Alex corralled the puck and slammed it home to make history! Alex was quickly mobbed by his teammates rushing the ice and was showered with cheers and hats from both fanbases for reaching this historic milestone. Also have to shoutout the one fan who threw his hat I think he was throwing it as soon as the puck touched Ovi’s stick just love that confidence from that fan he knew.
To put into perspective how crazy Ovi reaching 800 on a hat trick is, people thought when Derek Jeter got his 3,000th hit on a home run was crazy odds getting your 800th goal on a hat trick I think is miles and miles more difficult and rare given that only two others have 800 goals and 33 players have 3,000 hits, just wild when you think about it. He is now only two goals way from passing Howe for 2nd on the all time list and then the chase to the Great One will begin!
This goal also made Alex the second-fastest to reach 800 behind Gretzky who did it in 1,116 career games where this was Alex’s 1,305th game. This was also Ovi’s 29th career hat trick which moved him into 6th place for hat trick in NHL history.
Ovi now has 20 goals in 31 games nbd, which has him tied for 5th in the league and 6 goals behind McDavid.
Also, this graphic below is actually insane and shows how incredibly soft Crosby and Malkin are!
This team is on a 5 game winning streak with their Captain making history all it takes is a little momentum and fun to get this team back on track so you just love to see the guys celebrating together and even Ovi being more happy for the win than his record shows it!
It was very cool to see after Ovi got his beer shower from the boys that the first person that hugged him was Nicklas Backstrom. I’d be lying if that didn’t get me a little misty eyed seeing the boys share this moment because you know Nicky wants to be on that ice so bad.
So after all this the Caps scored a touchdown and extra point beating the Blackhawks 7-3 and they will be back in action against Dallas tomorrow. Will more history be made? If Ovi has anything to do with it then the answer will be yes!
The Morning Skate 