[29-Feb-2016] #OviWatch #HoltBEASTWatch... etc.

Friday night against the Minnesota Wild, Caps goalie Braden Holtby won his 39th game of the season, as captain Alex Ovechkin scored his 40th goal. Both would advance no further after Sunday's loss to the Chicago Blackhawks on a controversial goal that probably should have been an icing call instead. 

#OviWatch

With 40 goals this season, Ovi joins Phil Esposito, Brett Hull, Bobby Hull, and Luc Robitaille as players who have had eight 40-goal seasons. The record is (of course) held by Wayne Gretzky, who reached the 40 goal plateau a dozen times.

Here's where he stands in the all-time scoring list:

33 - Brian Trottier - 524 G, 1279 GP
34 - Pat Verbeek - 522 G, 1424 GP
35 - Dale Hawerchuk - 518 G, 1188 GP 
36 - Alex Ovechkin - 515 G, 819 GP
37 - Pierre Turgeon - 515 G, 1294 GP
38 - Jeremy Roenick - 513 G, 1363 GP
39 - Gilbert Perreault - 512 G, 1191 GP
40 - Jean Béliveau - 507 G, 1125 GP
41 - Peter Bondra - 503 G, 1081 GP
42 - Joe Mullen - 502 G, 1062 GP
43 - Lanny McDonald - 500 G, 1111 GP
44 - Glenn Anderson - 498 G, 1129 GP

With 61 games played, 21 games remaining, Ovi can still hit the 50-goal mark, if he scores a goal every other game. 

#HoltBEASTWatch

With 39 wins so far, and 21 games left to play, Holtby inches closer to the mark set by Martin Brodeur for wins in a single season (48). He has nine wins to go to tie that mark, 10 to surpass it. 

(Note: Although Holtby reached the 39 win platform in 50 games, he has now played 51 games.)

08 - 1982-83: Pete Peeters (40W in 62GP) V* 
       1984-85: Pelle Lindbergh (40W in 65GP) V*
       1987-88: Grant Fuhr (40W in 75GP) V*
09 - 2015-16: Braden Holtby (39W in 50GP)

       1995-96: Chris Osgood (39W in 50GP) J* 
       1998-99: Martin Brodeur (39W in 70GP)

Let's hope the loss against the Chicago Blackhawks was a fluke - like that no-call icing, and a couple of other things the zebras missed (like the elbow to Marcus Johansson's head...?) and not a sign of things to come... The team looked better as a whole, and Holtby was doing very well until the whistle failed to sound. Then he got caught with his goalie pants around his ankles. Ick. Yeah, I'm going to figure it for a fluke and leave it at that.

#KuzyaWatchin'

One goal over the weekend; no primary assists for Evgeny Kuznetsov, who still leads the league in that category with 35.