Apr 1, 2025, 07:51 PM ET
BOSTON — Alex Ovechkin scored his 891st career goal, moving him four away from passing Wayne Gretzky’s NHL record, and Dylan Strome broke a third-period tie Tuesday night to lead the Washington Capitals to a 4-3 victory over the Boston Bruins.
Ovechkin gave the Capitals a 2-0 lead with about four minutes left in the first period, pushing a cross-crease pass from Strome into an open net. He has 12 goals in his past 18 games and eight games remaining this season to catch Gretzky.
The 39-year-old Russian, who also shot wide on an empty net in the final minutes, will continue his pursuit Wednesday night against the Carolina Hurricanes.
“It’s getting close,” Capitals coach Spencer Carbery said. “You can feel it. You can definitely feel it.”
Ovechkin entered the season 42 goals short of breaking the regular-season record by The Great One that had long seemed unapproachable. Now in his 20th NHL season, Ovechkin was on pace to get to 895 in February before breaking his left leg in a shin-on-shin collision in November. He sat out 16 games but resumed his pursuit at Toronto in the Capitals’ first game after the Christmas break.
“I go back to when he was injured and out for a while. When that happened, everyone was kind of thinking to themselves whether or not it was going to be possible,” goaltender Charlie Lindgren said. “But anything’s possible with Alex Ovechkin. We’ve seen that this far. We’ve got eight games to go, and the best thing about it is it doesn’t feel like there’s any pressure at all. And the team’s enjoying it.”
Earlier this season, the Washington captain became the 60th player to record 700 career assists. He joined Gretzky, Gordie Howe, Jaromir Jagr, Marcel Dionne and Phil Esposito as the only players with 700 goals and 700 assists, one of several milestones in his career.
On Tuesday, the club padded its lead in the Eastern Conference standings, as Nic Dowd and Tom Wilson also scored for Washington. Lindgren made 21 saves to help the first-place Capitals end a three-game losing streak.
“I thought we had a decent first [period], and it got away from us in the second,” Strome said on the Capitals’ postgame show on the Monumental Sports Network. “They obviously took it to us. We got a 2-0 lead, and maybe thought it was going to be easy. But they’re a good team, and we had to find a way to battle back in the third and get some timely goals.”
Ovechkin is averaging a little less than two goals every three games. At that pace, he would pass Gretzky in the penultimate game of the season, at the New York Islanders on April 15.
David Pastrnak had two goals, Vinni Lettieri scored one and Jeremy Swayman stopped 27 shots for Boston, which lost its ninth in a row.
The Bruins came back in the second, getting a goal from Lettieri six minutes into the second and then the tying score by Pastrnak with three minutes left in the period. But Strome gave Washington the lead midway through the third, grabbing a rebound off the back wall and slipping it past Swayman.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
