Is it Father Time, or just bad luck for Alex Ovechkin this season?
Stephen Whyno of The Associated Press stopped by Daily Faceoff Live to discuss the Washington Capitals and Alex Ovechkin’s recent goal slump.
Finally, after 14 games, Ovechkin found the back of the net in Thursday night’s overtime win against the Columbus Blue Jackets.
Ovechkin has just six goals this season and is on pace for a career-low of 16. Whyno weighed in on whether it’s “father time” playing a role and catching up to Ovechkin in his race to smash Wayne Gretzky’s goal record, or if it’s simply a goal slump that the Russian Machine can get himself out of.
Tyler Yaremchuk: We welcome in Stephen Whyno of The Associated Press. We can’t start any conversation about the Washington Capitals right now without talking about Alex Ovechkin. Is this just a slump or are we seeing legitimate signs that Father Time is finally catching up to Ovi?
Stephen Whyno: Father Time is undefeated and we know that scorers don’t do this, nobody other than Phil Esposito has scored like this into their now mid-30s. But a little bit of bad luck, bad puck luck, is what is going on that’s keeping Ovechkin from scoring. Not maybe 15 or 20 goals but he should have more than six goals this season. I do think it’s a bit more indicative of falling off a cliff, hockey players rarely age gracefully and Ovechkin looks like a 38-year-old hockey player and he’s now on pace even after ending his goal drought at 14 games, on pace for 16 goals in a season and when he’s 66 goals away from Wayne Gretzky the math is getting hard.
Frank Seravalli: The math certainly is getting hard. When I’m looking at Ovechkin’s game I’m seeing the slow down.
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