Alex Ovechkin is chasing down Wayne Gretzky’s all-time goals record of 894. But, according to Tom Gulitti of NHL.com, he’s still chasing down the Great One’s game-used stick for his massive stick collection.
Gretzky famously promised Ovechkin he would give him one if he won the Stanley Cup.
Ovechkin did exactly that, but “I’m still waiting,” he told NHL.com in a wide-ranging interview that covered the Russian machine’s goal-scoring prowess.
Ovi’s obsession with getting a Gretzky game-used stick has been well documented, as he has a collection of opposing players game-used sticks he started when he burst into the league in 2005. So far, his favorite stick is one from Mario Lemieux.
“You play against the great players, and when you are growing up, you play against a person like [Jarome] Iginla, Owen Nolan, Mario Lemieux, [Dominik] Hasek, [Martin] Brodeur,” Ovechkin said. “You want to have something to remember it. It’s like history.”
In 2011, Gretzky sent Ovi a personalized-signed stick, but it wasn’t game used.
During a dinner in 2016 in Malibu between the Gretzkys and Ovechkins, Ovi requested a stick from the Great One from his playing days.
In an interview with SI Kids in 2017, Ovi lamented he still had not received the stick.
Gretzky made the promise to In Depth with Graham Bensinger.
Most recently when the Caps visited Hockey Hall of Fame to donate a Stanley Cup ring, Ovi coveted a stick used by Maurice “Rocket” Richard, but the Hall denied his request.
Here’s how Ovechkin described what happened to NHL.com.
Not shy, Ovechkin asked, “Can I have it?”
“I have a big collection, so it would be nice to have it,” Ovechkin said.
“They said, ‘No.'”
It is now 2019, almost a full year since Ovi fulfilled his side of the bargain of winning a Cup. Perhaps Wayne has upped the ante since. Given that Gretzky thinks Ovi could catch his all-time goals record, Gulitti posited that Ovechkin wouldn’t be given a stick until he passed the record.
Headline photo: @aleksandrovechkinofficial
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