{"id":342939,"date":"2025-12-11T20:39:04","date_gmt":"2025-12-11T20:39:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/342939\/"},"modified":"2025-12-11T20:39:04","modified_gmt":"2025-12-11T20:39:04","slug":"alex-ovechkin-still-leads-the-league-in-this-very-important-statistic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/342939\/","title":{"rendered":"Alex Ovechkin still leads the league in this very important statistic"},"content":{"rendered":"

After a slow start, Alex Ovechkin is cooking and having a simply sensational year once again. <\/p>\n

The 40-year-old Ovechkin has 29 points (14g, 15a) in 30 games this season. Ovechkin recorded 22 of those points \u2014 12 goals and 10 assists \u2014 during a 16-game stretch from November 5 through December 3, which was highlighted by a hat trick<\/a> and four-point night against the Montreal Canadiens on November 20<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Incredibly, Ovechkin now sits second on the Capitals in goals \u2014 three behind Tom Wilson\u2019s 17 \u2014 and is tied for 26th in the NHL, 10 goals behind Nathan MacKinnon\u2019s league-leading 24. <\/p>\n

While Ovi\u2019s not currently in the running yet for his tenth Rocket Richard Trophy, Ovechkin is dominating in another statistical category. One could even say he has an iron-like grip on the top spot.<\/p>\n

Per Money Puck, Ovechkin leads the league in fewest defensive zone starts at five-on-five this season. He is the only NHL regular to receive 0 this season<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ovechkin has received 119 of his five-on-five starts in the offensive zone (23.2 percent) while he\u2019s gotten 80 in the neutral zone and 313 on the fly (i.e., a shift change at the Capitals bench while play is ongoing). Meanwhile, Ovi\u2019s received absolutely none in the defensive zone from head coach Spencer Carbery, a strategy employed by the NHL\u2019s reigning coach of the year to great effect.<\/p>\n

Ovechkin is scoring at a clip where he\u2019d have 38 goals by season\u2019s end. At five-on-five, his line with Dylan Strome and Anthony Beauvillier had the 13th best expected goals percentage in the NHL as of December 7.<\/p>\n

\"Best\ud83d\udcf8: @moneypuckdotcom\/X<\/a><\/p>\n

When Ovechkin is on the ice at five-on-five, the Capitals have outscored their opponents 26 to 12 and out-attempted (53.2%), out-chanced (55.4%), and out-high-danger-chanced (52.9) them by pretty large numbers.<\/p>\n

So Ovechkin may not win the Selke this season, but his career is getting another shot in the arm from great coaching.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After a slow start, Alex Ovechkin is cooking and having a simply sensational year once again. The 40-year-old…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":342940,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-342939","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-nhl","9":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=342939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342939\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/342940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=342939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=342939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=342939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}