Washington Capitals: When Alex Ovechkin scored his first hat trick

Washington Capitals fans, can’t get enough of Alex Ovechkin? Neither can we.

Back on January 13, 2006 the Washington Capitals were in Anaheim taking on the Mighty Ducks. The mightiest thing in the league that season though might’ve been the play of rookie Alex Ovechkin and on that particular night, he scored his first career hat trick.

Ovechkin has 23 hat tricks in his career thus far and we’ve all been fortunate to watch him play night after night for the last 14 seasons. Ovechkin already had taken the league by storm in his rookie season. He scored twice in his NHL debut and helped recreate excitement surrounding hockey in the DMV.

After a scoreless first period the speedy rookie gave the Capitals the lead 1:45 into the second period. Shaone Morrisonn got the puck to the Chris Clark who found Ovechkin ahead of the defense to put it past Ducks goaltender Jean-Sebastien Giguere for his 28th goal of the season.

The Ducks tied it at 4:02 with a goal from Joffrey Lupul with Todd Marchant and Scott Niedermayer with the helpers. Lupul as you may remember was a Game 7 villain two years later as a member of the Philadelphia Flyers. Sorry about that but hey, there was still the Stanley Cup last year!

Ovechkin gave the Caps the lead right back at 12:06 with a spin-o-rama goal for his second of the game. Clark once again had an assist with Dainius Zubrus credited with the secondary.

At 17:44 the Ducks tied it with a goal from Travis Moen assisted by Samuel Pahlsson and Keith Carney. All the scoring took place in the second period and with a 2-2 deadlock the game needed overtime. Who else but Alexander the Great?

It seemed like Ovechkin continued to outdo himself night after night. In the overtime, Ovechkin took a pass from Zubrus and after a toe-drag shot it through the legs of defenseman Francois Beauchemin as well as the five-hole of Giguere to give the Capitals the 3-2 win.

It was Ovechkin’s 30th goal of the season and once he put it through, Ovechkin slid head first down the ice as his teammates chased him.

It’s amazing how much the league has changed in the last 13 years since that game. Both teams have vastly different uniforms and each club has a Stanley Cup banner hanging in their arena. It’s crazy to think this was the first of 23 hat tricks for Ovechkin and he might not be done yet.