During a match that watched Marc-Andre Fleury honored for having achieved 500 wins in the NHL, Patrick Kane note his 700th assist in the league and Nicklas Bäckström make his long-awaited season debut, succeeded Alex Ovechkin still end up in the center. The 36-year-old Russian scored his 274th powerplay goal in his career – the most in the league’s history – when the Washington Capitals fell 5-4 in overtime away against the Chicago Blackhawks.
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– I do not know if it is even possible to say so much more anymore, said Capital’s coach Peter Laviolette about Ovechkin, before he chose to lift another moment in the match:
– Do you know what’s so nice about ‘Ovi’? When we equalize there at the end (Ovechkin assisted Conor Sheary with three seconds left to play) you see how much it still means to him. He loves the sport of ice hockey. It’s great to see how excited he still is about such things. But yes, his powerplay goal was nice. He had good help from his teammates and he offered a real finish.
Ovechkin became the match’s first goal scorer when he 3:36 into the second period, in powerplay, sent off a direct shot straight up in Fleury’s right cross after fine preparation from TJ Oshie and Nicklas Bäckström.
Video: CHI-WSH: Ovechkin nets in powerplay – again
For Bäckström, who made his season debut after spending the summer and autumn rehabilitating a troubled hip, the point was less important. More important was that the hip held – and it did.
– The hip felt good, but of course it felt a bit that you did not play a match for a very long time, the Swede said after the match. It will take a while before you get the timing back, but we got home a point at least tonight so that was important.
The assist score was Bäckström’s 115th in his career to a goal from Ovechkin in powerplay – the most assist of all time in the NHL from one player to another in games in numerical superiority.
For Ovechkin, the goal meant that he is now in a shared lead with Dave Andreychuk for the most powerplay goal of all time in the NHL. Both Andreychuk and Ovechkin are on 274 hits in numerical superiority.
As most people might have expected, Bäckström’s return after injury meant a boost for Capital’s powerplay. Prior to the game with the Blackhawks, the Capitals had gone goalless in powerplay in six straight games (0-for-10). Not to mention the fact that the notorious PP shooter Ovechkin has only scored two goals in games with one more man on the ice so far this season.
Expect that thing to change in the future.
But the Blackhawks did not seem content to just sit and watch while Ovechkin wrote history. Instead, the home team responded by scooping three goals in 34 seconds between 13:55 and 14:29, signed Alex DeBrincat, Philipp Kurashev and MacKenzie Entwhistle. Daniel Jump made sure to reduce the Capital’s disadvantage to 3-2 when he sent in the puck with 42 seconds left to play the period.
Goals from Lars Eller and DeBrincat, again, in the third period gave the Capitals a 4-3 lead to catch up and with only three seconds left on the clock – and the goalkeeper picked for an extra outfielder – the guests succeeded.
John Carlson fired a shot that bounced on a Blackhawks defender to Ovechkin, who in turn slid down the left technical circle and slipped a backhand into the castle where Conor Sheary cut to straight.
The performance from Ovechkin also meant that he went up alone in the lead of the NHL’s scoring, before the Edmonton Oilers duo Connor McDavid and Leon Draisitl, with his 46 points (21 + 25) in 29 matches during 2021-22.
The match was also the 15th (out of 29) this season for Ovechkin where he accounted for at least two points.
Caleb Jones then settled for the Blackhawks 1:21 into overtime.
Capitals make their next match on Saturday night, 02.00 Swedish time (Viaplay), against Winnipeg Jets. Then Ovechkin gets his first opportunity to take sole control of the record for most powerplay goals of all time.
And if he did, well then it will most likely happen after a performance from radar partner Nicklas Bäckström… for the 116th time.
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