In the first period of tonight’s game against the Jets, Alex Ovechkin fired a wrister past Winnipeg goalie Connor Hellebuyck, putting the Caps on the board first. That goal snapped a personal three-game goal drought, and put him back on top of the League’s goal-scoring leaderboard.
It was also career goal #599, one step closer to making history yet again.
But as the game went on, it felt like that wasn’t going to be the end of Ovechkin’s story for the evening. He had wanted #599 badly… but you could tell that once he got #599, he wanted #600 even more.
He didn’t make any of us wait all that long to get it. Less than four minutes into the second period, there was Ovechkin pushing a rebound past Hellebuyck to not only give the team back their lead, but to further cement himself as one of the greatest goal-scorers of all time.
At this point, in his 13th season, the milestones are almost too numerous to count – but that doesn’t mean we ever tire of talking about them. As noted back in January:
It’s been less than two months since that last milestone, and no, it really doesn’t get old. Appreciating the fact that we get to watch this guy steamroll through record books and franchise history, and get to do so on a nightly basis? It just doesn’t get old.
We are witnesses to a hockey legend, and every single record that falls, every single milestone he hits, is just one more story we get to tell to the next generation of hockey fans – that we got to watch Alex Ovechkin play.
Thanks for continuing to write a great story, Ovi – and here’s to many more.