Lost in the chaos and controversy of the Capitals’ 5-1 loss to the Boston Bruins was Nicklas Backstrom’s 700th career assist.
The apple put Backstrom in exclusive company, among a who’s who of Hockey Hall of Famers. Backstrom is the first Capital, the 10th European player, and the 54th NHL’er in history to reach the milestone.
After the game, the Capitals posted a tribute video and several teammates shared their congratulations for Backy.
Nicklas Backstrom, the best assist man in Washington Capitals history.
Congrats on 700, Backy!#ALLCAPS | @LeidosInc pic.twitter.com/C5fVQrQD1v
— Washington Capitals (@Capitals) March 6, 2021
Alex Ovechkin, who has been the benefactor of nearly 40 percent of Backstrom’s assists, said of his longtime running mate, “congrats brother!700🍎!!its fun to watch what u can do with the puck,and play with u my man!keep do the gr8 job!love u bro!❤️💪💪🙏🏻”
TJ Oshie said, “That’s a crazy number of assists. All while never wanting or needing any recognition for a single one. Unreal passer and better teammate.” He added a hashtag that said “#FutureHallofFamer.”
Congrats @backstrom19 on 700 🍎‘s. That’s a crazy number of assists. All while never wanting or needing any recognition for a single one. Unreal passer and better teammate. Congrats #19 #FutureHallofFamer
— TJ Oshie (@TJOshie77) March 6, 2021
Capitals owner Ted Leonsis agreed with Oshie, saying that Backstrom has a “Hall of fame career playing out in real time for our fans.”
Steady. Dependable. Leadership. Hall of fame career playing out in real time for our fans. Nicklas Backstrom first to reach 700 assists for @Capitals.#ALLCAPS https://t.co/UMNgYaaQRt
— Ted Leonsis (@TedLeonsis) March 6, 2021
“Obviously I lied to you guys before saying I’d enjoy it. Here we are losing 5-1,” Backstrom said after the game. “It’s tough when you lose a game like this and the way we played too. Hopefully, we can get a win next game so I can think about it more.”
Yeah, that was a bummer, but still. Say it with us together: future Hall of Famer Nicklas Backstrom.
Russian Machine Never Breaks is not associated with the Washington Capitals; Monumental Sports, the NHL, or its properties. Not even a little bit.
All original content on russianmachineneverbreaks.com is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0)– unless otherwise stated or superseded by another license. You are free to share, copy, and remix this content so long as it is attributed, done for noncommercial purposes, and done so under a license similar to this one.
Share On