Twenty-one years ago Monday, Caps captain Alexander Ovechkin was a fresh-faced, barely 20-year-old NHL rookie going through the pregame paces ahead of his NHL debut that night, Oct. 5, 2005, in downtown D.C. against the Columbus Blue Jackets. Because that game followed a lockout that wiped out the entire 2004-05 NHL season, it was the first game played at the building then known as MCI Center in a span of 550 days.
The Caps held their morning skates in the big barn on F St. at the time; their current practice facility in Arlington was under construction at the time and was still more than a year and a half away from opening. Whatever words were spoken by coach Glen Hanlon, newly minted captain Jeff Halpern and any other players and coaches in the room that morning are lost to the sands of time, but the 20-year-old Ovechkin – the youngest of the 40 players to dress for both teams for that night’s season opener – likely didn’t speak many of them. An eager sponge seeking to improve his English in those days, he merely listened.
That night, Ovechkin went out and made several statements on the ice. Forty seconds into his first NHL game and shift, he hammered Columbus defenseman Radoslav Suchy into the boards behind the Columbus net, knocking out a pane of glass and necessitating a brief delay until the ice crew could replace it.
In the second period, less than half a minute after Columbus took a 1-0 lead on a goal by 20-year-old Jackets winger Dan Fritsche, Ovechkin pumped home a one-timer from the slot to even the game at 1-1.
When Fritsche answered back with his second of the period, Ovechkin again replied, this lime less than a minute and a half later, on the power play.
Jeff Halpern, the local Potomac. Md. favorite was in his first night as the Caps’ captain that evening, and Halpern later supplied the game-winner in a 3-2 Washington win. He also assisted on both of his rookie linemate’s goals.
After that victorious NHL debut, Ovechkin was his usual ebullient self.
“I feel my dreams come true. I play in the NHL. We win.”
“We win this game and I scored the goals. And I’m very happy.”
Monday morning, exactly 21 years after that dashing debut, Ovechkin, now the captain of the Capitals for nearly 17 years, addressed his modern day Caps teammates in the Washington locker room ahead of a Monday morning practice session at MedStar Capitals Iceplex.
This was his statement:
“Good morning, guys. It’s hard to say, but guys, I told you a week ago, this is going to be my last year. I’m pretty sure for me and my family, it’s important for you guys to know first. And yeah, it’s sad, but it is what it is. We have a \\\\-ing unbelievable team this year, we have 82 games left, let’s make the playoffs, let’s have fun and enjoy the moment, because you know times fly for young guys in their first year, or experienced guys.
“Remember that moment and enjoy the time, because how I said, times fly. It seems like yesterday I was here in my first year, and right now this is my 22nd year, and it goes like this [snaps fingers]. It’s hard, but let’s enjoy it and let’s do some special things this year.”
Among those listening raptly in the room to their captain announcing the impending end of an era, were two young teammates – Cole Hutson and Ilya Protas – who were born the year after Ovechkin’s debut.
After his teammates rose to cheer and honor him, Tom Wilson stepped across the room to be the first to embrace Ovechkin, followed by others. Over the remainder of the day, some of his teammates and others who have witnessed various portions of his career reflected on a memorable ride of over two decades – more than half Ovechkin’s life – and a career that spans 20 percent of the NHL’s existence and more than 40 percent of the Capitals’ existence.
Between the mornings of Oct. 5, 2005, and Oct. 5, 2026, Ovechkin scored more goals – 929 of them – than any player who ever played in the 110-year history of the National Hockey League. And he still has 82 regular season games remaining with which to add to that total.
Ovechkin has had 251 teammates with the Capitals; he has been teammates with more than 40 percent of all players who’ve worn the uniform here in the 52 seasons of Washington Capitals hockey. He has outlasted – by well over a decade in most cases – each of the other 39 players who suited up for Columbus and Washington on that Wednesday night 21 years ago, when the Caps opened their 2005-06 season with that home game against the Jackets.
More than a dozen of those 39 players went on to work in varying capacities in the NHL after their playing days ended, including three who have been head coaches in the League.
The last player from Ovechkin’s debut game to play his last NHL game was fellow former first overall pick Rick Nash (2002 to Columbus), who played the final game of his own 15-year career in the League on March 17, 2018, less than three months before Ovechkin and teammates hoisted the Stanley Cup in Vegas.
Ovechkin retains some clear memories of that debut night in the NHL some 21 years ago, even though nearly 1,600 more games have followed.
“It was like yesterday,” he says now. “I live in my apartment – like two minutes walking from the White House – and my dad, my mom and my brother was with me. Obviously, I was nervous, and I was kind of shaking, but I don’t remember particularly what the boys were telling me. But I remember feeling like I have support from my family, the whole organization and my teammates, and I just went out there and played my game.”
Ovechkin’s memories of the actual game are accurate.
“First shift, I hit my [defenseman] and break the glass. And obviously scored two goals and we won the game, and it was a special moment.”
As with most NHL players making their debut, it’s a family affair.
“I remember that my parents went to the locker room and spent time there with me, but mostly I don’t remember,” he recalls. “I remember the game, I remember we went to the restaurant where we celebrate NHL debut, two goals and a win.”
These days, Halpern is in his ninth season as an assistant coach – and two-time Stanley Cup champion – with the Tampa Bay Lightning. Halpern’s longevity attests to his coaching acumen, but he prefaces his first impressions of Ovechkin with the admission that he’s “not a top identifier of talent.”
“There were no readily accessible YouTube or Instagram highlights of Ovi, so you really had no idea what he was like, and you didn't know why he was a superstar,” Halpern recalls. “And the first time I saw him skate was at Laurel Ice Gardens in a summer skate. We had found our own ice, and I remember thinking how choppy of a skater he was, and I was like, ‘Man, how is this guy as good as [Sidney] Crosby – who was coming to the League that year – or the superstars of the League at that time? It didn't make a ton of sense.”
Halpern and Dainius Zubrus were Ovechkin’s linemates that opening night game 21 years ago.
“That first hit against Suchy kind of caught your eye,” Halpern says, “But for me, at least, it wasn't, ‘Okay, there he goes.’ It was, ‘Wow, that's different.’ Because the team held him out of a lot of preseason games, and he wasn't running guys in training camp; and he had a bit of a bubble around him, so to speak. Like, guys weren't about to hit him, and he wasn't running around hitting guys. So, that was the first indicator in that game, at least that something was different.
“And then even the first goal he scored, it's basically a one-timer from the high slot, and I remember knowing it was going to be shot, and then it hitting the back of the net. I was like, ‘Man, that happened fast.’ And you didn't think about it being such a precursor to how many goals he was going to score, maybe not from that exact spot, but something similar. So, that was a big moment.”
Caps president of hockey operations Brian MacLellan does qualify as a top identifier of talent, even though he’d never verbally identify himself as such. MacLellan’s own first impressions – he started out as a scout and was assistant general manager and director of player personnel at the time – were more of the off-ice variety.
“I don’t think anybody could have fathomed what he's accomplished in that time frame,” says MacLellan. “I remember being at the [NHL Draft] combine. We're obviously going to pick him; I don't know that there was a choice there. It's like we won the lottery. We're going to get him, and I remember him coming into the interview room or the draft room, interviewing him, and then him coming in during the fitness testing. He'd keep coming back, and you’d see how engaged he was, how he made eye contact with everyone. He couldn't speak the language very well, but he was shaking everybody's hand, and it was just pure enthusiasm and excitement about being drafted and starting in the NHL.
“I remember that vividly, and just being shocked by how excited he was to get drafted and to play, which comes out in that [debut] game. I wasn't at that game, but he came into the League like that. Every day, he's coming in just jacked, excited to play, practice, be at the rink. And then people are saying, ‘He can't keep up that energy for a whole season, you know?’ Because it's just tiring; you play physical, you're scoring, it's a lot of energy emotionally, physically. And for him to do it this long is nuts.”
Chris Patrick, the Caps’ vice president and general manager, was in business school when Ovechkin debuted. But he grew up in the area as a Caps fan from the dark early days of the franchise, and he followed Ovechkin’s rookie exploits from afar.
“It just felt like that first year, every time we played a team for the first time, you knew he was going to do what he had done to other teams, and they just didn't know it was coming,” says Patrick. “And it was the physicality; a [defenseman] would be turning the net with the puck and not realize Ovi is going to come steamroll them, right? Or it'd be him scoring off the rush, how many times did he score shooting it through a defenseman's legs, and the goalie never sees it?
“He would pick teams apart that first time through, and then the second time he played them, it’s like, ‘All right, now what's going to happen when they know what to adjust for?’ And then he was still able to find ways to score and have an impact. And if it wasn't through scoring off the rush, it was on the power play or it was through the physicality. It was just watching him just single-handedly dismantle teams every time he saw them.
“And I just remember thinking for so many years when he was scoring at such an incredible clip, and if we got a 1-0 or 2-0 lead in a game where he hadn't scored yet, I'm in my head thinking, ‘Well, this is basically a 3-0 lead right now. At some point, O is going to score tonight.’ You basically went into every game thinking that he'll score tonight, and more often than not he did, which was incredible.”
Halpern is in the unique position of having been Ovechkin’s teammate during two different seasons, half a decade apart. He was the Washington captain during Ovechkin’s rookie season, and he returned to the Caps for a single season in 2011-12, soon after Ovechkin became captain. In between and after those two seasons, he played against The Great Eight.
“The whole city embraced that Rock the Red [slogan],” Halpern recalls. And it was him, it was [Nicklas] Backstrom, it was [Alexander] Semin, it was all those young guys, and he was the leader of the whole thing. But it brought so much excitement to the arena, and then eventually the city. And that was all him. That's the way he played the game.”
Halpern signed as a free agent with the Dallas Stars after Ovechkin’s rookie season. Playing in the Western Conference, his road trips back to the DMV were rare in those days, twice every three seasons. But a Feb. 26, 2008, trade sent him to the Lightning, just as the Caps were heating up for their late season 11-1-0 spree that landed Ovechkin and his mates in the playoffs for the first time that spring.
“I hated coming back there,” says Halpern of playing the Caps in D.C. in those days. “We played there my first year in Dallas, and it was fine. But when I got traded the next year to Tampa, and we went back there, [the Caps] were on their [late-season] run. They were the worst team at Thanksgiving, and [then-coach] Bruce [Boudreau] took over, and the team went off. I don't know if they lost a game the rest of the year, but you went into that building and you felt it.
“It was one of those places where you just didn't want to be minus-three at the end of the game, and it stayed like that for a long time. So, coming back there sucked as a visiting player, and in Tampa, we did that a lot.”
Following a short stint in Los Angeles and a season in Montreal, Halpern returned to his hometown team as a free agent in 2011-12. The Caps roared out to a 7-0-0 start that season, but Boudreau was dismissed before the end of November. Dale Hunter coached the rest of that season.
“And then to come back [to the Caps] in ’11-12, and be part of it,” Halpern reflects, “I wish that year went better for me and the team, but it was really fun to see Ovi in a different role.
“He was such a young, excitable guy that first year. I still remember when he scored that goal [“The Goal”] in Phoenix [on Jan. 16, 2006]. Brendan Witt was a free agent the following year, and the big thing at the rookie dinner a couple nights before was every time Witter would talk, the guys would be shouting, ‘One more year, one more year!’ And when Ovi scored that goal in Phoenix, I wasn't on the ice, but all the guys said as soon as he got in the huddle, he was screaming ‘One more year, one more year!’ to Witter, because Witter was one of the guys in the whole pile. He went from being such an excitable kid to all of a sudden, now he's a man. So, when I came back it was different to see him in that role.
“He was so impressionable when he got there, and everything was with a smile, and everything was for the first time, it was new for him. And if you remember that [’11-12] year, it was a bit of a struggle for him. I'd say in his career it was probably one of his most down years. I don't know what the stats say, but it was a down year for him. And I also think that he'll look at that year, and he'll point to that year as a really big growth year for himself as well.
“But it was interesting for me, because I was taking a bit of a backseat, so I had the chance to kind of watch him in a lot of those situations, and it was it was a huge change, obviously, in that amount of time.”
Ovechkin has always acknowledged the frustration of those seasons when the Caps were unable to get over the playoff hump, and he briefly touched upon that frustration again on Monday.
“I think of that experience we have through all those years, all those ups and downs,” Ovechkin reflects. “We make playoffs, and we lost in the first round, then we lost in the second round, then we lost in the first round again. It goes ups and downs, ups and downs, and you think like, ‘Oh, geez, we're never going to make the third round, or we're not going to make and win the Stanley Cup.’
“And as soon as we started clicking, and everybody was on the same page, everybody was knowing their role, so everybody knows exactly what to do. And that's probably experience, from all those ups and downs and that's the kind of thing we have from all those years.”
Winning that Cup likely help keep Ovechkin in D.C. and may have also helped him surpass Wayne Gretzky’s once seemingly untouchable mark of 894 career goals. Without the Cup in 2018, maybe Ovechkin departs via trade or free agency, and maybe his numbers don’t climb to their current levels.
“I think winning the Cup was a huge deal,” says MacLellan. “I think of the stuff we went through before winning it, and the pressure on him that was applied from a lot of different directions. And I think his career probably is looked at differently if we don't win in 2018.
“There are always going to be some naysayers. I think winning the Cup was a huge accomplishment, deal, relief – all those things – and it helped define him there's so many stories and things that went on before that, and winning the Cup alleviated a lot of that pressure.”
With 82 games remaining this season, Ovechkin’s all-time career mark of 929 goals has some upward mobility, but as he mentioned in his address to the team, and as he mentioned in his press conference, he wants to win.
This season, Ovechkin became the longest tenured athlete in D.C. pro sports history, surpassing Walter “Big Train” Johnson, who logged 21 seasons on the mound for MLB’s Washington Senators from 1907-27.
Like Ovechkin, Johnson had to wait until late in his career – age 36 in 1924 – before finally leading the Senators to a World Series championship. “The Big Train” made one more trip to the World Series.
Speaking of big trains, Wilson had some wise words on the incentive of winning one more Cup for Ovechkin to cap off his final season.
“I don't think the motivation necessarily changes that much for that specific reason,” Wilson declares. “For me, I want to win a Cup for each guy next to me, including Ovi. Obviously, it's going to be a bit of a last dance – or whatever you want to call it – but there's a lot of guys in this room that are going to leave it all out there, and I want to win a Cup for everybody in this room; I think Ovi would say the same thing.
“That being said, whenever you have a legend in your room leading the way, I think it's an accountability and a drive and a hungriness that we all have to show up, and an accountability to him to keep this thing moving in the right direction, and the culture and the drive that he's created here, so it'll be crazy. I think now that it's out there a little bit, it's going to be a lot of respect from other teams. It's going to be a lot of things that he deserves, and I don't know what it'll entail, but we're really excited for him. I couldn't be prouder of everything he's done for this city and this team. And there'll be plenty of time for me to say thank you to him. But for now, it's a teammate, and let's go and try and win as many games as we can.”
In recent years, we’ve witnessed recent retirement tours for beloved long-term NHLers in their final seasons, such as Marc-Andre Fleury, Anze Kopitar and others. Knowing of his reticence for accolades and attention that takes away from the team, Caps coach Spencer Carbery brought up the topic of what a retirement tour might look like.
“I talked to him about that,” says the bench boss. “I think O – as you guys all know – doesn't want that. But he understands that he's such an important piece of this sport’s history, and for this generation.
“And I told him a story yesterday. Imagine going into, I used the example of Minneapolis, and he's only going to go there once [more], and a 12-year-old kid right now, his dad's 45 and says, ‘I'm going to take you to go see Alex Ovechkin play.’ And a 12-year-old or a 10-year-old gets to go see him play, and in 30 years will tell his kids about watching Ovi play his last season in Minneapolis.
“And for him, even though he doesn't love that and the [postgame] handshakes and it being about him individually, I think there is part of him that's understanding that people want to say goodbye and people want to see you for the last time and know this is Alex Ovechkin playing in St. Louis, in Minneapolis – go down the list – for the last time, which I think is important.”
Dylan Strome is one of the many players who came to Washington on a short-term basis and quickly signed a five-year extension to stay here. Now in his fifth season with Washington, he has skated more minutes with Ovechkin than anyone else since arriving here in 2022-23. Strome’s 274 points (98 goals, 176 assists) are second only to the captain’s 278 (149 goals, 129 assists) across that span.
“These four plus years, for the most part, being on this line consistently, it's been a true honor, and it's been a lot of fun,” says Strome. “It's been a lot of fun just to watch him on the ice, the way he interacts with his teammates, how happy he is when other guys score; like, he's happier than I am when I score, and that's hard to do sometimes. It's been an incredible honor and you take every day. So much happens in a day around him and it's just so fun to be a part of his team and I'll remember it for the rest of my life.”
A prominent feature of the Caps’ culture is the familial atmosphere where players’ children routinely visit their dads’ workplaces, both downtown and in Arlington. Kids love getting a skate in with dad, and they love roaming the Plex and taking in the games at Capital One Arena.
When Ovechkin came into the League, there were few players with children; it was an extremely young team. As he has aged and had children of his own – his young sons have been wild about the game since they were toddlers – so have Ovechkin’s teammates.
“My kids are very happy when they get to come to the rink, and Ovi's a big personality,” Strome relates. “And for whatever reason, my daughters, when they see Ovi, they light up. I think that's just the person he is. A few times he's brought my kids up to the room. My kids don't just go with anyone, and Ovi says, ‘You want to come with me?’ And they just grab his hand and walk up to the room. So it's the infectious personality, even to a five- and a three-year-old it spreads around, and it's a pleasure to be around.”
“I never knew about it coming here,” says Carbery of Ovechkin’s persona as a captain. “I knew him because I've been through training camps and had met him before, but I never really truly understood his style as a leader and as a captain. And then when you get around him, my first year here, and see how he interacts with his teammates, and see what he does for your locker room on a daily basis, then you start to truly appreciate his qualities as a captain.
“And it goes so much further beyond the goals and his office on the power play and what he's capable of doing on the ice. He just brings an enthusiasm every single day. It does not change whether it's January 25th or it's March or the first day of training camp. He just has an enthusiasm in there and a joy for the game, a joy for life, a joy for his teammates and being around them. It doesn't matter if you've played 1,000 games or you played five games. You are in the mix with him, and that – and I've said it a number of times – is why I feel so strongly about our locker room and why it's such a tight knit group. It's because of his leadership.”
Those 251 players who were NHL teammates of Ovechkin – and the coaches and staff – will certainly have some stories to tell about his legacy and their individual relationships with him. Halpern’s first impression of Ovechkin may have been skeptical, but his lasting impression of the Great 8 certainly is not.
“I always think of this,” Halpern begins. “He is the greatest goal scorer of all time, and he could also change a game and with a hit. And it's funny, Jordan Tootoo used to run around Nashville, and he was a monster. And then they started giving the fans those little ‘Too-Too’ horns. But at least you would know he's on the ice, so he was giving you a warning, and it was great.
“And playing against Ovi, he had all this jewelry on, all those necklaces. And he and when he skates around, you can hear him. It’s like a, ‘Chuh-chuh-chuh-chuh,’ and he takes those three hard steps and goes and kills.
“I played with Jamie Heward in Tampa when basically Ovi knocked Hewy out, and it was that same thing. You hear the chains coming, and then it's a monstrous hit, and so that was your indicator. You knew to brace and get ready for it, and again that was the hard part of playing in that building against that team. They're going to put up six on you, and if you don't get out of the way, they're going to hurt you. And so that was a credit to Ovi obviously, for giving that team that identity for so long.”
As Halpern notes, he could be a menace against foes. But Wilson – now the second longest tenured active pro athlete in D.C. – has only played with and never against Ovechkin.
“It’s greatness,” says Wilson of his longtime teammate. “You can’t put it into words. I think for a lot of guys that step foot in this locker room, it's one of the biggest honors of our career to be able to share the ice with a legend like that. He's a great. He'd be in every single Hall of Fame in the game and best goal scorer of all time.
“And for all of us, it's just been a pleasure and a privilege to watch him day in day out, and I feel very lucky to call him a good friend and see his family grow. And he's just a legend, and he's carried the weight of this organization and driven the game of hockey in this area as a superstar for 22 seasons. And I don't think anything's going to change today, but obviously going forward, there'll be a lot of emotions, a lot of time to reflect, celebrate. All the above.”
We’re not likely to see an athlete of his ilk and/or his magnetism pass this way again soon, and his impact on the local DMV region is significant and enduring. Ovechkin is more than a generational figure. The first and last years of his career are virtually a century later than those of Walter “The Big Train” Johnson. The exploits of Ovechkin’s on ice locomotion will linger in these parts for a long, long time.
“I have nieces and nephews that don't know an NHL without Ovechkin playing in it,” says Patrick. “My kids, from when they were born, Ovi has been playing in the NHL. I've got a daughter in college now, and it's incredible to think that there's a whole generation of adults right now that don't know the NHL without Alex Ovechkin playing in it, which is an incredible thing to think about.
“When you look at that, it's going to be a huge adjustment for people, to see the League year start without Alex Ovechkin on the Washington Capitals, and the impact he has had. And when you look in this area at the number of kids playing youth hockey now, we're probably onto the second generation. There are probably kids of kids that started playing hockey when Ovi was a rookie. And you can do whatever you want to have that kind of grassroots growth, but having a star like Alex Ovechkin playing for so long in one market, there's no way to match that as far as growing the game in an area.
“And I think turning Washington D.C. into a legitimate hockey city – and not just the city where the Commanders play that also has a hockey team – is another thing; we became a sports storyline in this city because of Ovechkin, even in the years before we won the Cup. Because now we were a real legit contender, we didn't just have a plucky team that might have a run in the playoffs. We had the best player in the game, and any year we could have a chance to win the whole thing, and we just had never had that in Washington in my lifetime in hockey for sure. And outside of a few years in football, we never had that in any sport.
“So, I think the further we get away from it, the more we will realize just what an incredible thing it was. And then just the fact that he played so many games, his health, and what he fought through to play almost every game, every season. It’s going to be something looking back on it. It's going to be incredible when we when we look through the actual numbers and the records. It's going to be actually hard to fathom.”
