Washington Capitals team captain and future Hall of Fame Left Winger Alex Ovechkin has had quite the storied career. A Calder Trophy winner, 12 NHL All-Star game selections, 9 Maurice Richard trophies, a three-time Hart trophy winner, the list goes on. But today, we will be looking back at one of his less recognized milestones, career goal number 200.
The 200th goal
Besides the number themselves, career goal number 100 and 200 have quite a few notable differences. Goal 100 came against a division rival in the New York Rangers while goal 200 came against an out of conference foe in the Los Angeles Kings. Goal 100 was on a power play, goal 200 was not. Goal 100 was also on a Hall of Fame goaltender in Hendrik Lundqvist, goal 200 was not (at least not yet...).
Now going back to the main story of this milestone of Ovechkins. The 33-15-4 Capitals were hosting a struggling 21-21-7 Kings in the Verizon Center. Similar to looks, records were deceiving. The Capitals jumped out to an early 1-0 lead curtesy of Alexander Semin, but the Kings responded by scoring the next three goals, making it 3-1 Kings.
The teams then traded goals and ended the second period at 4-2 in favor of the Kings. The third period did not see much action early, with the first 10 minutes going scoreless.
However, Ovechkin and the Capitals had other plans. Capitals center Nicklas Bäckström caused a tie up on the face off, and the puck bounced around into the stick of Ovechkin as he intercepted a Kings breakaway pass attempt. Ovechkin saw an opportunity, and with no one but Quick to beat he ripped the puck past Quick into the net for goal number 200 and a 4-3 game with the Capitals closing in.
The unfortunate similarity to goal number 100 was the end result of the game as the Kings would go on to win 5-4. The Capitals would go on to reach the 50 win mark, but fall in seven to the rival Pittsburgh Penguins. This would be one of the early episodes of what seemed to be a kryptonite to the Capitals, but as we know today, things would swing in the favor of the Capitals big time in 2018.