The Washington Capitals won big last night, taking a 6-2 win over New Jersey, with Alex Ovechkin lighting the lamp twice – so, while his six-game goal streak was snapped over the weekend, he still has eight goals in his last eight games, doubling his season total prior to that streak.
Spencer Carbery joined the Junkies Wednesday as he does every week for some Caps chat, and within that discussion of the Devils win and their playoff push, Coach Carbs had this to say about Ovi:
“Post-break, there’s just been a little bit more jump in his step. I feel like even last night, there's a little bit of physicality and details inside of his game. It feels like he's handling the puck a little bit cleaner and he's getting to harder areas, like he gets to the net front on the power play goal last night. Pucks are jumping off the stick, and whether it's the break or whether it's a couple go in and now he feels a little bit more confident, you can just feel that going into games, he feels really good, and you can see in his touches that he's a real confident player, and he expects to score every time he gets out there.”
Here’s the thing with Ovi’s surge, too: when he had just nine goals at the All-Star break at the end of January, there was serious concern that the bottom had fallen out of Alex’s chase for the NHL goal record, and he was likely to finish at No. 2.
Enthusiasm is surging back ahead, but there’s another rub: Ovi has apparently said that he plans to retire when his contract expires, which means the end of the 2025-26 season. He has 838 goals, so he’s 56 away from tying Gretzky and 57 from passing him – and now that his pace for the season is 24, meaning 846 come the summer, all he needs is three 25-goal seasons (counting this one) to do it.
“He’s on a heater right now; if you asked me two weeks ago, I would have said 18 maybe, now it seems like, yeah, 25,” JP said when asked what he thinks Ovi’s total will be.
“I think 23 to 25 is a good number to land on with his current situation,” Cakes said.
But what if he ends 2025-26 at somewhere around 885 or closer?
“I can’t imagine he’s going to retire if that’s the case – you think he's really going, you think he's really gonna retire and walk away when he's 10 goals away from Gretzky?” Cakes asked. “Like, Ted Leonsis gonna say, ‘you can't walk away, you need to stay and break the record here with the Washington Capitals.’ So, he’ll tack on another year on his deal, pay him $10-$11 million or whatever the going rate is, and Ovi will break the record in that third season if he needs it.”
“If he gets to 25 goals this year, he’ll need 48, and the only way he's gonna retire is if he's got like a career ender,” Bish said. “Like, something serious where it's gonna take too long to get back. He's definitely gonna play until he breaks it.”
Then again, what if he had played February-April like he played up though the break?
“If he finished this season with 14 or 15 goals, and then had another similar season next year – I do think the great ones at some point say, ‘’This is below my standard, I don't want to go out like this,’ and you just walk away,” JP said.
“Could he potentially do that? Sure,” Cakes replied, “but if he’s 10 or 12 goals away at the end of this contract? I would be completely just sideswiped and beside myself if he didn't come back to get the record at that point. You can't walk away from the greatest accomplishment in the NHL's history when you're that close to it.”
Bish agrees, and of course, Ovi needs only look back on the last three weeks as proof he could, potentially, turn it on again.
Take a listn to the Junkies’ entire convo above, as well as Carbery’s weekly visit!