As Tom Wilson’s cross-ice pass traveled towards the top of the circle, Alex Ovechkin’s eyes lit up. In his favorite spot on the ice, open on the power play, Ovechkin slung a rocket towards the net to beat New York Islanders goalie Ilya Sorokin, history had been made. The Washington Capitals superstar had scored his 895th career NHL regular season goal breaking Wayne Gretzky’s record of 894 goals set in 1999. A record just a mere six years old that seemed otherworldly, a record that was almost untouchable until Ovechkin entered the league in 2005.
Ovechkin entered the league with a bang, scoring 52 goals and totaling 106 points in his rookie year with the Capitals; he would win the Calder Trophy as the Rookie of the Year and finish sixth in the Hart Trophy voting for Most Valuable Player. A superstar in the making, Ovechkin seemed destined for greatness; but Gretzky’s record still seemed untouchable. Ovechkin would have to maintain a 50-goal-per-season pace over the next 17 seasons to eclipse Gretzky’s record. There were many stars before him that appeared on track to break the 894-goal mark, but the biggest problem that would arise was injuries. Mike Bossy totaled 573 goals following his age-30 season, but injuries forced him to retire, and Mario Lemieux tallied 613 goals at the age of 31 but back problems forced him into early retirement. For Ovechkin to break Gretzky’s record he would have to be a machine and that he was.
The Russian Machine would win his first of nine Rocket Richard trophies as the league’s leader in goals in the 2007-08 season where he tallied 65 goals, while also winning his first of three Hart Trophies. Ovechkin would stay healthy and keep the machine rolling as he continued to rack up the goals and slowly creep up on Gretzky’s record. Following his age-30 season, Ovechkin has racked up 525 goals in 839 games, but with all the statistics he had put up, he still hadn’t found any team success. Not until 2018 when the Capitals finally broke through winning the Stanley Cup in five games over the Vegas Golden Knights. Ovechkin scored 15 goals in the Capitals playoff run and won the Conn Smythe Trophy as the postseason’s most valuable player.
The reality of Ovechkin breaking Gretzky’s record started to come to life when Ovechkin scored his 700th career goal in 2020, where he became the second player outside of Gretzky to score 700 goals before their 35th birthday. During that season he would earn his ninth Rocket Richard trophy and age didn’t look like it was slowing him down. Then in the 2021-22 season, Ovechkin would record his ninth 50-goal season of his career raising his total to 780 goals, which put him third all-time.
The following season, Ovechkin would record his 802nd goal of his career passing Gordie Howe for second all-time. Now only one man stood in front of Ovechkin in this chase to be the greatest goal scorer in NHL history, Wayne Gretzky. Over the next two seasons, Ovechkin would keep on scoring and inch closer and closer to the Great One’s record.
On November 18, 2024, Ovechkin suffered a broken fibula against the Utah Hockey Club and would miss sixteen games as he sat just 26 goals away from breaking Gretzky’s record. But that injury wouldn’t derail Ovechkin’s season, instead, he went on a run recording 25 goals in 41 games to tie Gretzky at 894 goals. That leads us to this afternoon where Ovechkin’s power play strike with 12:34 remaining in the second period broke Gretzky’s 36-year record and solidified Ovechkin as the greatest goal scorer in NHL history.
In 20 NHL seasons, Ovechkin had rewrote the history books winning nine Rocket Richard’s, three Hart trophies, recording nine 50-goal seasons, scoring the most power-play goals of all time, the most empty net goals of all time, the most goals with one franchise, and 895 career goals. A legendary run by a generational player, and something that we may never see again, cementing himself as the greatest goal-scorer of all time and a surefire first-ballot Hall of Famer.
Lenny Talks Sports 
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