Coming off back-to-back Hart Trophy-winning seasons, Alexander Ovechkin has had a tremendous start to the current season, scoring a pair of goals and adding the game-winner in the 3-2 shootout victory over Nashville to race out to the early lead in the Richard Trophy and Art Ross Trophy race.
Ovechkin's eighth and ninth goals puts him at better than a goal-per-game pace (one that would equal Wayne Gretzky's record-setting 92-goal season), and also has the superstar at a two points-per-game clip of 164 points.
While Ovechkin has always been a streaky scorer and certainly will be hard-pressed to keep those torrid paces up over 74 more contests, he currently has two more goals than fellow countryman Ilya Kovalchuk of Atlanta and three more points than San Jose's Joe Thornton who is currently second in the scoring race.
Saturday's game was quite a showcase for the Russian superstar, as he scored on a power-play with a one-timer off of Mike Green's feed, did an offspeed shot through Dan Ellis' pads on a break and then capped his evening with a nifty shootout goal that earned the extra point for Washington - earning chants of "MVP" and a shower of hats for his unofficial hat trick against Ellis.
The rest of Ovechkin's teammates were glad to his production, since the only player to dent the twine was their star against a goaltender struggling in the very early stages of the campaign. It also was Ovechkin's fourth multi-goal game of the campaign, and his second straight with his two-goal performance against San Jose Thursday night which proved to be the difference in that contest.
Just under a tenth of the way through the season, the usually slow-starting star has been anything but quiet out of the gate this season. With his two points Saturday, Ovechkin already has more points in this October than he has in any other October in his career - besting his 15-point performance in 2007-08 - with five games still left to play in the month.
Add to that as well that he has contributed seven helpers along with his nine goals, and it certainly bodes well for Ovechkin's chances to recapture the Art Ross after Evgeni Malkin edged him out of the scoring title last season.
It certainly would be difficult for Ovechkin to match Gretzky's 92-goal watermark, it is worth noting through eight games of the 1981-82 campaign, the "Great One" only had notched five goals, going scoreless against the Hartford Whalers in Edmonton's eighth game that season - with Gretzky having four fewer goals than Ovechkin stands after Washington's eighth game of the current season.
While Ovechkin has been simply brilliant during his tenure as a Capital, this season stands to be better than his previous four campaigns in D.C. thanks to a quick start. And, thanks to him, the Capitals took a pair of points largely thanks to his sheer talent and scoring touch.
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