Alex Ovechkin is on a march toward history and he’s keenly aware of it. The Capitals captain has been collecting his own milestone memorabilia and has been asking for other stars’ gear as the Caps play through their season.

The reason why is that Ovechkin has always been open about wanting to donate or open some type of hockey museum in Russia when his career is over, but there’s been a secondary effect of all that gathering.

He’s becoming a bit of a hoarder and apparently, that’s wearing on his wife.

Ahead of his 1300th career game, Ovechkin told the media after the Capitals’ morning skate in Calgary on Saturday that he’s been “saving sticks, jerseys, gloves.”

He was asked where he was keeping it.

“In my gym, in my house right now,” Ovechkin said. “Basically my whole basement is some jerseys. Nastya don’t like it because every time I have gloves or helmets, she’s like ‘Jesus, when are you going to get rid of this.’ I say, ‘Well, we’ll see, we’ll see when it’s going to happen.'”

That's not a pro shop. That's Alex Ovechkin's game-used stick collection.
🏒Which ones mean the most?
🏒How many does he have?
🏒Lemieux, Gretzky, Crosby, Matthews…who else?
🏒What do Nastya and Sergei think of the collection?
Some answers ⬇️: https://t.co/ApcOPxIgaH pic.twitter.com/XIlosyiXaZ

— Tarik El-Bashir (@Tarik_ElBashir) November 11, 2021

This has been an issue for a while according to Ovechkin.

“To be honest with you right now, I have a lot. My wife tell me to stop. We don’t have any space in our gym,” Ovechkin said in 2020. “It’s great for my family, kids, grandkids when I’m gonna be dead. My kids gonna look at it and appreciate it.”

You can see some of the collection in these interviews with ESPN and Match TV.

Ovechkin keeps sticks and pucks during his own historic milestones. When he scored goal number 700, he kept almost all of his equipment.

“Pucks, sticks. I think I’m going to do gloves as well,” Ovechkin said then.

Several hockey legends have given twigs to Ovechkin. Wayne Gretzky famously gifted one of his sticks after Ovechkin completed his challenge of winning the Stanley Cup. Recently Darius Kasparaitis gave Ovi one of his most famous sticks from his career.

Screenshot: ESPN