Washington Capitals: Top 3 observations of the season so far
#1 Alex Ovechkin is a man on a mission
The best news and number one observation is that Alex Ovechkin is playing like a mad man at age 36 and it’s a good thing. Part of it is having the need to step up with his teammates banged up. Another part of it has been the improvement of play from Evgeny Kuznetsov. Either way, Ovechkin enters Thursday night against the Detroit Red Wings with the chance to be all alone in fourth place in the NHL scoring race.
In addition, Ovechkin required the second fewest games in NHL history by a 36 year old to reach the 20 point mark in a season with 11 goals and 10 assists in 12 games. Ovechkin recorded a goal and two assists in Washington’s 5-3 win over the Buffalo Sabres. It moved him into a tie with Brett Hull with 741 career goals and his second assist was the 600th of his career.
Ovechkin became the ninth active player to reach the 600 assist mark. 368 of Ovechkin’s 600 assists are primary assists which accounts for 61.3 percent which is the fifth highest percentage among active players with 600 assists.
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In addition Ovechkin passed Alex Kovalev (599 assists) for fifth on the all time assist list among Russian born players and now trails Pavel Datsyuk by four assists for fourth place. Wild stuff because almost everyone see Ovechkin as strictly a goal scorer.