The story behind the David Pastrnak tweet calling Tom Wilson the NHL’s best goal-scorer has more clarity, I guess.
Wednesday after practice, Wilson spoke to reporters and confirmed that Pasta lost a bet which resulted in the ridiculous tweet. But Wilson did not take the bait explaining what said best was.
By Ian Oland 3 years ago
“David Pastrnak” “tweeted” that Tom Wilson is the game’s best goal scorer, Tuesday night. The tweet is currently going viral on Twitter.
It’s unclear if this is Pastrnak’s real opinion or if he was hacked. The Capitals and Bruins are staying at the same hotel together, Toronto’s Hotel X, meaning Pasta’s phone or computer could have been grabbed by a pranking teammate or opponent.
By Ian Oland 3 years ago
David Pastrnak, who tied Alex Ovechkin for the league lead in goals (48) this season, received his home country’s Golden Hockey Stick after being voted Czech Hockey Player of the Year. Pastrnak (519 points) beat out the Blackhawks’ Dominik Kubalik (370) and the Flyers’ Jakub Voracek (312), winning the Czech award for the fourth straight season. Pastrnak was voted first on 51 of 52 ballots.
“I want to hold a cup for the world champions and a Stanley Cup above my head,” Pastrnak said, according to NHL.com. “This is a pure individual trophy. I am very honored to have it, it is an inspiration for me. But I don’t play golf or tennis, so I won’t favor myself before my team.”
Jakub Vrana, who had 25 goals and 52 points in 69 games, was voted fourth best with 301 points.
While announcing the league’s 24-team playoff, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman declared the 2019-20 regular season over. That meant Alex Ovechkin would win his ninth Maurice “Rocket” Richard Trophy and share it with the Bruins’ David Pastrnak after both players scored 48 goals this past year. NHLPA boss Donald Fehr later cast doubt on that result, saying there had been no decision yet on where the stats would go for the NHL’s play-in games and round-robin games during the 24-team playoff.
Two days later, the NHL is officially announcing several of its 2019-20 regular-season award winners, suggesting this issue has been put to bed. Ovechkin and Pastrnak are confirmed to have won the Rocket while Leon Draisaitl won the Art Ross Trophy, the Boston Bruins won the Presidents’ Trophy, and the goaltending duo of Tuuka Rask and Jaroslav Halak won the William Jennings Trophy.
By Ian Oland 4 years ago
Alex Ovechkin would win his record ninth Maurice ‘Rocket’ Richard Trophy if the 2019-20 season does not restart due to the coronavirus pandemic. The Russian machine is tied with David Pastrnak with 48 goals.
The 34-year-old’s journey to the top spot in the league was fueled by late-season hot streak which saw the Russian forward score 14 goals in seven January and February games, including three hat tricks.
The Caps were inactive on a busy weekend in the NHL. While the team rested in Minnesota, two big regular-season races — the one to win the Metropolitan Division and the one to win the Rocket Richard trophy — had some important developments.
By Peter Hassett 4 years ago
The Boston Bruins put up a four-spot on the Washington Capitals in the first period, chasing Braden Holtby. With the result never in doubt during the game’s final 40 minutes, the two teams turned to hitting, wrestling, and score-settling to keep things interesting.
Late in the third period, Tom Wilson and David Pastrnak, the NHL’s leading goalscorer, exchanged hits and punches at the Capitals bench. It started a mini line brawl.
By the end of it, players on both the Capitals and Bruins were angrily hugging and yelling at each other. Wilson and Pastrnak took their disagreement to the penalty box and continued their discussion until the Capitals forward was tossed from the game after receiving a 10-minute misconduct.
Alex Ovechkin has been voted into the 2020 All-Star Game and will be the Metropolitan Division All-Star’s captain. This year’s All-Star Weekend will be held in St. Louis.
The NHL announced the news shortly after 8 PM.
By Ian Oland 4 years ago
David Pastrnak is having a career year at age 23. The Bruins superstar has 25 goals in 31 games and is on pace (66) to nearly double his career-high of 38 in 2019-20.
Wednesday, Pastrnak will suit up against Alex Ovechkin and the Washington Capitals for the second time this season. In the team’s first meeting of the season in late November, Pasta scored his 17th goal of the season, beating Braden Holtby on a sharp angle.
Since then, Pastrnak has scored eight more times and leads Ovechkin by four in the NHL’s goal-scoring race. Pasta, however, feels like his lead is tenuous.
Alex Ovechkin scored a hat trick last night. Sure, it was a weird hat trick with two empty-netters, but it still counted. If anything, I think the flukiness of that hat trick underscores how Ovechkin’s age-34 season has gone so far and how he’s such a special player.
Prior to Saturday, Ovechkin had been scoring on 12.9 percent of his shots, a good clip, but notably below his 14.4 in the last prior seasons. With three goals on four shots on Saturday, Ovechkin is now at 14.8 percent on the season. That hot streak has put him back in the Rocket Richard race for most goals in the NHL.
This accomplishment is, at once, both unremarkable (“there goes Ovi again”) and stupefyingly special. No one at age 34 is supposed to be this productive. Then again, no one else is Ovi.
By Peter Hassett 4 years ago
