By Joe Pohoryles
275. Despite playing on what’s been the Washington Capitals’ worst power play in recent memory, Alex Ovechkin passed Dave Andreychuk to move into sole possession of first on the all-time power play goals list, with 275 in his career.
Last April, I predicted Ovechkin would break that record 34 games into the 2021-22 season. Ovechkin did what he does best and beat expectations, but just by a single game. His power play goal against Detroit on New Year’s Eve got him the record in the 33rd game of the season.
While that milestone is well worth celebrating, in the grand chase that this column focuses on, Ovechkin has (predictably) slowed down a bit from his initial red-hot pace, but he’s still right behind Edmonton’s Leon Draisaitl for most in the NHL.
With 24 goals in 35 games, Ovechkin’s goal scoring rate is now .686 goals per game. In this past month alone, keeping in mind that multiple games have been postponed, he has scored four goals in nine games.
Nearing the halfway point of the season, assuming the Capitals end up playing all 82 games this season, Ovechkin is now on pace for 56. Chances are that’ll miss a few games down the stretch for maintenance or otherwise (hopefully not a COVID list stint), but 50 goals is still in the cards.
The good news is that there will be no Olympic break for NHL players. That’s bad news for anyone wanting to see Connor McDavid, Auston Matthews and a handful of other stars play in their first Olympics, as well as older players (including Ovechkin) taking what could be their last shot at Olympic glory, but for the goal record chase, it’s good.
Losing Ovechkin to an injury at all will be devastating, but if it happened at the Olympics… I guess it wouldn’t make much of a difference but for some reason that would feel worse to me. I guess the point is rather than spending two weeks scoring non-NHL goals, he will now be able to focus fully on the Capitals, and keep upping his totals.
And despite breaking the power play record this month, he’s gonna have to do the brunt of the work at even strength because the power play is just abysmal:
Not having Nicklas Backstrom or TJ Oshie for much of that stretch hurts, but there has to be more to it than that. There have been complaints about the power play even when it wasn’t struggling, and many fans begging for assistant coach Blaine Forsythe to switch things up.
Regardless of where the issues lie, the Capitals (and goal chase) could really use another Ovechkin hot streak. Sitting at 754 career goals, Ovechkin needs just 13 more to pass Jaromir Jagr for third all-time, which will likely happen in mid-March, barring any drastic changes to the schedule.
As mentioned, he’s on pace for 56, but we’ll stay conservative and project him to score an even 50. That would mean he ends the season with 780 career goals, 14 ahead of Jagr for third on the all-time list, and 21 behind Gordie Howe for second.
Ovechkin would presumably pass Howe for second all-time next season, but he’d be 114 behind Gretzky next year if he does indeed finish 2021-22 with 50. With four years left on his contract, his required “goals per season” would drop from 33 to 28.5.
That means even a 30-goal season next year would keep him ahead of pace, and I have a hard time believing a healthy Ovechkin would score fewer than 30 goals next season.
As many have speculated, it seems like 50 is the magic number this season. 45 would be good, but this may be the last chance Ovechkin has at a 50-goal campaign. Let’s hope it doesn’t pass him by.
Cover Photo Credit: USA TODAY
The Wildcard 