After making NHL history during the regular season, Washington Capitals star Alex Ovechkin made some personal history in his team's Game 1 win over the Montreal Canadiens on Monday.
Ovechkin scored the first playoff overtime goal of his career to propel the Capitals to a series-opening 3-2 victory at home in his 152nd career postseason game.
"A goal is a goal," Ovechkin said after the victory. "Good things happen when you go to the net."
Ovechkin is the all-time leader in regular-season overtime goals with 27 in 1,491 games. They're part of his career total of 897 goals, having broken Wayne Gretzky's NHL record of 894 goals this season.
"The guy's the best player in the world. What else can you say?" said Capitals goaltender Logan Thompson, who made 33 saves in the win. "He comes in clutch. All game. It's a privilege to be his teammate."
After an icing call, Capitals forward Dylan Strome won a faceoff, with Montreal forwards Patrik Laine and Ivan Demidov failing to clear the puck. Winger Anthony Beauvillier collected the puck for a shot on goal and then tracked down his own rebound to Montreal goalie Sam Montembeault's right. Montreal's Alex Newhook and Kaiden Guhle went to defend Beauvillier, who slid a pass to an open Ovechkin on the doorstep for the goal at 2:26 of overtime.
The overtime tally completed a monster night for Ovechkin.
He opened the scoring on the power play at 18:34 of the first period and then assisted on Beauvillier's second-period goal to make it 2-0 before finishing off the pesky Canadiens in overtime. It was the 37th multipoint performance and 10th multigoal game of Ovechkin's playoff career.
Ovechkin also had seven hits in the game to lead all skaters.
Ovechkin is the oldest skater in Stanley Cup playoff history to factor in all of his team's goals in a game. He also became the fourth-oldest player in Cup playoff history to score an overtime goal at 39 years and 216 days. Detroit's Igor Larionov was 41 years old when he scored a triple-overtime goal in Game 3 of the 2002 Stanley Cup Final against the Carolina Hurricanes.
With his first goal, Ovechkin passed Patrick Marleau and Esa Tikkanen (72) and tied Dino Ciccarelli (73) for the 14th-most playoff goals in NHL history. Ovechkin's 74th career playoff goal put him in a tie with Joe Pavelski for the 13th-most career playoff goals.
The captain's overtime heroism rescued Game 1 for the Capitals. The top seed in the Eastern Conference watched the Canadiens rally in the third period on goals by Cole Caufield and Nick Suzuki 5:13 apart to send the game to overtime.
"You can see why they made the playoffs. That team doesn't quit," Thompson said. "In the third, they didn't go away. We've got to respect them. They took it to us in the third."
But rather than give Montreal some much-needed confidence and a series lead in its upset bid, Ovechkin shut the door in overtime.
"He played a hell of game tonight," Beauvillier said.