It should come as no surprise to anyone paying attention that Alex Ovechkin’s hot start has earned him some early-season honors from the NHL. With an insane seven goals in his first two games, Ovechkin takes home the first “First Star” award of the 2017-18 campaign, headlining a trio that includes Marc-Andre Fleury as the second star and Wayne Simmonds rounding it out at third.
After starting the previous 12 seasons with no more than “just” three goals or “just” six points through two games, Ovechkin became the first NHLer in a century to pick up a hat trick in each of his first two outings (and added an extra goal and a shootout tally to his accomplishments for good measure).
It’s a long season yet, but Ovechkin is already about a fifth of the way to last year’s 33-goal total – about as good a start as any of us could have hoped for from the Great 8.
Congrats, Ovi!
ARLINGTON, Va. – Washington Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin has been named the NHL’s “First Star” for the week ending Oct. 8, the NHL announced today.
Ovechkin led the League in goals and points (7-0-0) as the Capitals opened the season with two victories. On Oct. 5, Ovechkin notched his 18 th career hat trick in a 5-4 shootout victory over the Ottawa Senators. Two nights later he matched a career high by scoring four times in a 6-1 win over the Montreal Canadiens. With hat tricks in each of the Capitals’ first two games, Ovechkin became the fourth player in NHL history and first since 1917-18 to record hat tricks in each of his team’s first two games of a season. His seven goals give the Moscow, Russia, native 565 for his career, good for 22 nd on the all-time list of NHL regular-season goal scorers.