Alex Ovechkin decided against retiring from the NHL and signed on for one more season with the Washington Capitals in early July. While he has since said that he doesn’t know if the 2026-27 campaign will for sure be his last with the Caps, that has not stopped speculation that Ovechkin signed on for just one final ride.
If it is to be Ovechkin’s NHL swan song, teams around the league will surely want to honor one of hockey’s all-time legends with a postgame handshake line after their final game of the season against him and the Capitals. However, Ovechkin is thought not to love the idea of a farewell tour, and he was recently asked whether he would agree to one in an interview with RIA Novosti’s Andrey Senchenko.
“Anything is possible,” Ovechkin said, as translated by Google Translate. “We’ll see. It’s hard to say right now. Only God knows how the season will go. Will I agree to a handshake ceremony if the opponents offer it after the games? I can’t say anything right now; I don’t even know myself. We’ll discuss it when I get to Washington with my family.”
Previously, it was reported that Ovechkin admired how Wayne Gretzky ended his career in 1999 by announcing his retirement ahead of his final regular-season game. Gretzky’s final game, against the Pittsburgh Penguins on April 18, 1999, featured a postgame ceremony and the announcement that the NHL would retire his number 99 league-wide.
While Ovechkin may not want the handshake-line treatment all season, he has led the charge for the Capitals in giving it to other retiring legends. At the end of the 2024-25 season, he called his teammates back out onto the ice to acknowledge Minnesota Wild goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury, and did the same last season with Los Angeles Kings forward Anze Kopitar.
Ovechkin, still undecided about his future, declined the same honor from the Pittsburgh Penguins last April.
Alex Ovechkin waves off Pittsburgh Penguins handshake line
If the upcoming season is to be his last, Ovechkin would play his final home regular-season game at Capital One Arena against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Sunday, April 4. His final regular-season game would come against the Philadelphia Flyers at Xfinity Mobile Arena on Saturday, April 10.
Ovechkin’s potential final contract with the Capitals officially expires on July 1, 2027.
