(Caps Outsider)
Caps superstar Alex Ovechkin won his fourth-consecutive Rocket Richard trophy this past season, and sixth overall. He also became the highest goal-scoring Russian player in the NHL, and joined the 500 club. Let’s look ahead to milestones within his range this coming season.
For Ovechkin, the 2016-17 season will include one super major milestone, when he hits 1,000 career points. At 966 right now, expect him to get his 34th point of the season around the halfway mark, give or take (in Ovi fashion, it’s sure to be a goal). He’ll be the 37th player to score 1,000 points with one team.
As for goals, Ovechkin has averaged a little more than 50 goals in the past four seasons (he maintained the same pace during the lockout-shortened season when he scored 32 in 48 games). His slump in the 2011 and 2012 seasons (32 and 38 goals) can be explained by the Caps’ coaching at the time. Before those two years, he still averaged a few more than 50 goals a season.
Despite his goal-scoring consistency, his overall point totals are on the decline, as evidenced by his drop in assists in the past several years. At 31, his high point totals are most certainly behind him. But Ovi being Ovi, he’s likely to surprise even the most skeptical of us. So, it’s likely his high number of goals this season will be – at most – 50 again, though this number will certainly drop at some point in the next few seasons. At worst? Let’s just say 30, which only seems likely if he gets injured or if Trump wins.
Ovechkin, who has 525 career regular season NHL goals, is No. 33 on the all-time goal-scoring list, and will finish the season at most with 575, good for No. 21. This is right behind Mark Recchi and ahead of Mike Bossy (who scored 573 goals in 752 games). Let’s note that he’ll also pass Maurice ‘Rocket’ Richard while having scored more goals in fewer games (Richard had 544 in 978). Other players he’ll pass? Frank Mahovlich, Keith Tkachuk, Stan Mikita, Michel Goulet, Ron Francis, Johnny Bucyk, Guy Lafleur, Mike Modano, Joe Nieuwendyk, and Mats Sundin. Noteworthy, yes, but there won’t be any pucks displayed on the mantle for those, nor ceremonies proceeding of Caps home games.
As for Caps franchise records: He has every one of them that he’s expected to get, other than total games played (he’ll pass Calle Johansson in less than two healthy seasons). He’ll get 900 career regular season games this season, which is nice. He still could pass Peter Bondra if he scores at least 14 game-winning goals this season (his high is 11, which he did multiple times). Even getting 10 game-winners will place him in the top 7 all-time. Dennis Maruk’s season point total of 136 is out of reach. He could also score four or more hat-tricks this season, something only Bondra and Alex Semin have done for the Caps. He’s also four hat-tricks away from tying Bondra’s franchise record for total team hat-tricks.
But if there’s anything we really need to come together and root for in terms of an individual Ovi regular season milestone, no matter how ‘meaningless’ the stat… it’s that he passes Jeff Schultz as the team’s season leader in plus/minus (+50) in a season. That’s something we can all agree on.
