Can Alex Ovechkin still catch Gretzky’s goal record after season pause?

Even with the NHL season on pause, is it still possible for Alex Ovechkin to catch the once invincible Wayne Gretzky’s goal record?

There is perhaps no more intriguing story in hockey right now than Alex Ovechkin’s pursuit of Wayne Gretzky’s all-time goal record. A record that once seemed untouchable now seems within realistic grasp for the greatest goal scorer of this generation, as Ovechkin has recently hit the 700 goal mark and moved into eighth all time in goal scoring. At 706 career goals, Ovechkin sits 188 goals behind Gretzky’s record with hopefully plenty of career left to go.

However, no matter when this season pause ends, it seems all but certain that the regular season is over, which will unfortunately rob Ovechkin of even more goals in his pursuit of Gretzky’s all-time goals record. This would mark the third time in Ovechkin’s career that he would miss out on valuable goals due to circumstances out of his control.

Before the season paused, Ovechkin was tied with David Pastrnak for first in the league in goal scoring with 48 goals. Through 68 games, his goals per game of 0.71 was tied for the second-best of his entire 15-year career. If he scored at the same pace for the final 13 games of the season, he would’ve finished the season with 56 goals, his best in over 11 seasons. In terms of chasing Gretzky, that’s eight goals that he’ll have to make up later if he hopes to catch him.

Alex Ovechkin’s lost seasons

However, there are two other occasions that have affected Ovechkin’s pursuit of Gretzky. Ovechkin’s rookie season would have been the 2004-05 season, but that season was cancelled due to a lockout. In Ovechkin’s eventual rookie season a year later, he scored 52 goals, the third best goal scoring season in NHL history for a rookie. We’ll never know if Ovechkin would’ve had the same kind of historic season at 19-years-old, but just as an estimate lets say he scores at a 25 percent reduced pace, meaning he missed out on at least 40 goals for that entire season.

The second time this happened was the lockout shortened season in 2012-13. Despite the season being shortened to only 48 games, Ovechkin still scored at a blistering 0.67 goals per game pace, enough for 32 goals and another Rocket Richard Trophy. However over the course of an 82 game season of the same pace, Ovechkin would’ve scored 54 goals, meaning he potentially missed out on another 22 goals.

So, due to three separate circumstances entirely out of Ovechkin’s control, he has potentially missed out on give or take 70 career goals. Add that on to his current total and Ovechkin would have 776 career goals, putting him just 118 goals behind Gretzky’s record. At 34-years-old with still no indication of slowing down soon, it would really have just been a matter of time before Ovechkin officially became the greatest goal scorer of all time.

What would it take to best Wayne Gretzky?

However, according to Sportsnet Stats, even if no more regular season games are played this season, it’s still well within the realm of reality that Ovechkin can surpass Gretzky. If Ovechkin averages a 35-goal season going forward, he would pass Gretzky by Christmas 2025, when Ovechkin would be 40-years-old.

It would be a monumental challenge for even an ageless wonder like Ovechkin to still hit 35 goals at 40-years-old, but if he still has another 50 goal season in him next season or even the one after that, that would lighten the load for later in his career.

However, with speculative talks of potentially shortening next year’s regular season in order to have this season’s Stanley Cup Playoffs, it would just add even more goals to the list that Ovechkin would have to make up in order to even have a shot at breaking the record.

Missing out on just eight goals might not seem like a whole lot, but when it comes to chasing down a seemingly unbreakable record like Gretzky’s, every goal counts. But still, if there’s one person who could defy all of these obstacles and just keep scoring goals, it’s the Russian Machine, Alex Ovechkin.

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