Updated: Mar 22
March 29th 1999 was the day ‘The Great One’ netted his final of 894 NHL goals, surpassing the great Gordie Howe as the greatest goal scorer in NHL history. But the day January 16th 2025, almost 20 years after his first NHL goal, ‘The Great Eight’ Alexander Ovechkin, a military raised Russian from a miserable home, came within 21 goals of Wayne Gretzky’s unbeatable goal record. Here’s how a broken, military muscovite, Became one of the NHL’s greatest ever goal scorers.
Much like a number of Russian NHL players, Washington Capitals captain Alexander Ovechkin had a tough upbringing, miserable, and tough, characteristics that are normal with any eastern European player. But Ovechkin is different. Coming from a family of sports, his mother a two time Olympic gold medalist, and basketball world champion, and his father a football player, a family of prestigious sporting greatness, but still at the bottom of the food chain. Living in a derelict, and crumbling neighbourhood on the outskirts of Moscow, Ovechkin and his family lived in squalor, teaching himself the game of hockey from video tapes, dreaming of being the next Wayne Gretzky.
Alex’s childhood was tough, he attended a military ‘tyrannical’ school, learning discipline and loyalty to his country before joining the Dynamo Moscow sports school, little did he know this is where his journey of becoming one of the NHL’s greatest ever players would start. Alex’s childhood got no better after his close brother Sergei died of a blood clot when Alex was only 10 years old, a figure who started Alex’s great journey. Alex also stated how he threw himself into the game of hockey, and dedicated all of his time to the game, as he saw his friends retreat to drugs and alcohol, a deep hole he did not want to see himself fall into.
With Ovechkin scoring his 874th NHL goal on the 16th of January 2025, it all started with his first goal when he was 10, with Dynamo Moscow. After scoring 56 goals as an 11 year old with Moscow, Alex would break the first of over 45 records in his career, becoming the player with the most goals in a single season with Dynamo, a record previously held by NHL great Pavel Bure.
After being one of Dynamo’s greatest ever players in his four years at the club, he was drafted to the Washington Capitals with the first overall selections, as many labelled him the next Mario Lemieux. With years of hardship, growing up poor, his brother and friends around him all dying, Alex’s NHL dream became true, and on 5th of October 2005, Alex Ovechkin, a name barely spoken about around the league, scored his first NHL goal, little did he know, he had 873 more to come. Ever since Alex was a child his mother said his sporting greatness was inevitable, and how his hardship as a child would help him in the long run. With a tough and aggressive playing style, and a collective respect towards him amongst the league, Alex’s childhood and disciplinary upbringing, is a major factor as to why he will soon become the NHL’s all time top goal scorer, and will be a name which is remembered for decades, and a name engraved into NHL history.
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