SnapJolt

Each time Alex Ovechkin steps onto his treadmill at home, he first walks past hundreds of reminders of the Hall of Fame skaters he’s battled over the years, the All-Star goalies he’s beaten and the milestone moments he’s celebrated.

Those reminders? Sticks. A large number of sticks that he’s been collecting since his rookie season. Most are autographed, while some have personalized notes to Ovechkin from their previous owner.

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All of them mean something to No. 8. 

“When I was a little kid, I always ask for (a) stick when I go to the game,” Ovechkin said this week, asked about his affinity for sticks, and specifically game-used ones.

“You can ask every hockey player,” he added, “when they was young (and) they go to the game, they always ask for a stick from some players.”

For the Capitals’ 36-year-old captain, he never stopped asking. The first addition to his 200-plus stick collection was Mario Lemieux’s own from a Capitals-Penguins game early in the 2005-06 season.

Ovechkin’s latest addition to his collection was his own from Monday’s 5-3 win over the Sabres. In that game, he scored on a tip-in to tie Brett Hull for fourth-place on the NHL’s all-time goals list.

The next?

It will almost surely be the one he uses to score goal No. 742, vaulting him past Hull and leaving him 24 goals behind Jaromir Jagr, 59 shy of Gordie Howe and 152 short of Wayne Gretzky.

At the rate Ovechkin is scoring these days — he leads the league with 11 goals in 12 games — his next milestone goal could come as soon as Thursday’s game in Detroit.

The sticks rest on a custom rack along a couple of walls inside Ovechkin’s McLean, Va. home, near his exercise equipment.

“I think it’s pretty cool,” Ovechkin said. “When people come to my house, they say, ‘Oh, wow, this is pretty incredible.’”

Some of the sticks date back to 2005, like the Lemieux stick that started it all. Others are more recent, like the one he got from Auston Matthews a few seasons back. There are even sticks belonging to longtime rivals, like Sidney Crosby, sticks from players he appreciates for their laser-like shots, such as Steven Stamkos and Patrik Laine. There are a bunch from defensemen whom Ovechkin admires because they were so tough to get around, like Zdeno Chara and Shea Weber. There are even a few from all-time greats who retired before Ovechkin entered the league, like the one procured from Gretzky himself. 

“I also have an old CCM and Mark Messier signed it,” Ovechkin said. “It was in New York. That was kind of cool. I have Gretzky, Lemieux, obviously. I have Paul Kariya’s stick.”

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Although Ovechkin still has four years remaining on his contract after this one, he’s already thinking about where he wants the sticks to eventually end up once he retires.

“I want to open a museum back in Russia,” he said. “Because here people can see NHL (games), see it live. But over there it’s pretty hard. Hopefully, it’s going to be pretty cool to bring it all to them.”

To get a stick, Ovechkin usually ends up parting with one, too.

Sometimes the exchange is made player-to-player after a game. More often, though, a Caps’ equipment manager arranges the swap with his counterpart on the other team.

There are some sticks, though, that Ovechkin will not give up as they are too close to his heart.

“Do you remember the ‘hot stick’?” he asked, referring to his controversial celebration of goal No. 50 during the 2008-09 season.

“Of course,” the reporter replied.

“I have it,” Ovechkin said with a laugh. “I have lots of milestone sticks.”

Among them, of course, are the ones he used to score the big, round numbers.

“It’s hard to say,” he said, asked which ones rank among his favorites, “because every milestone is hard to get.”

After taking a moment to consider the question, he had an answer.

“I think 500, 600, 700. Those sticks are my favorite,” he said.

Asked if he would consider giving one up if, say, the Hockey Hall of Fame came asking, Ovechkin shot back an incredulous look.

“Come and get it!” he said as if he were issuing a challenge.

Ovechkin’s memorabilia collection is extensive. There are also framed jerseys on the walls and dozens of milestone pucks, too.

But it’s the stick collection that often ends up being the topic of conversation when family, friends and teammates visit.

“It’s great, especially for the people who see it (for) the first time,” teammate Dmitry Orlov said.“It’s a lot of history, a lot of great players.”

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Orlov, who is one of Ovechkin’s close friends, has had the opportunity to admire the collection up close and personal on a number of occasions. His favorite part is studying the details of each player’s stick — the brand, the length, the tape job, the flex, the lie, the curve. 

“There’s all different types of sticks,” Orlov said. “You can see what kind of curves they have, how the technology has changed over (17) years. It’s awesome to see it in different ways.” 

As Ovechkin’s climb up the all-time goals list accelerates, he’s become a lot more diligent about saving his own sticks.

In fact, he’s kept each stick that he’s scored with this season, handing each to a member of the training staff after fist-bumping his teammates. Each one is numbered — 739, 740, 741, for example. Eventually, they find their way into the trunk of Ovechkin’s Bentley and ultimately on the rack.

Because of his hot start to the season, it means more sticks have been getting added to the collection. And they’ve been getting added at a faster rate than before — which has drawn mixed reviews at home.

When asked what his wife, Nastya, thinks of the almost daily addition of a new stick, Ovechkin laughed.

“After every game, I bring like one or two sticks and she’s like, ‘Jesus!’” he said. 

His three-year-old son Sergei approves.

“The kids love it,” Ovechkin said. “(On Tuesday), I have a photoshoot and I have like probably eight sticks from different players. So, I bring it in and Sergei saw it and was like, ‘Oh, daddy! New sticks? For me?’

“I said, ‘No, when you’re growing up it’s going to be for you.’”

Ovechkin hopes the sticks become heirlooms.

“At the end of (my) career, it’s going to be pretty cool to have all (these) sticks,” he said, “(for) my kids, grandkids, all my friends.”

Indeed, the collection signifies hockey history in the making.

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“He’s coming closer to Gretzky so this is the time to do it,” Orlov said. “It’s history. It’s great, especially when he’s going to be enjoying retirement. He can look at them and see what he’s done in his career.”

(Top photo: Patrick McDermott / NHLI via Getty Images)

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