{"id":141324,"date":"2025-08-13T03:14:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-13T03:14:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/141324\/"},"modified":"2025-08-13T03:14:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-13T03:14:08","slug":"alex-ovechkins-return-back-to-united-states-planned-ahead-of-21st-nhl-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/141324\/","title":{"rendered":"Alex Ovechkin\u2019s return back to United States planned ahead of 21st NHL season"},"content":{"rendered":"

Alex Ovechkin<\/strong> is preparing to make his way back to Washington. Per RIA Novosti<\/a>, Ovechkin will reportedly return to the United States in \u201cearly September\u201d ahead of the 2025-26 NHL season.<\/p>\n

Though the Capitals have yet to announce a date for the start of training camp, players have already begun to gather<\/a> for informal skates at MedStar Capitals Iceplex and the team\u2019s first preseason game is scheduled for September 21<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ovechkin, who is set to turn 40 on September 17, has one year left on his contract with the Caps, though he\u2019s remained vague<\/a> when asked about his future beyond next season.<\/p>\n

Even after two decades in the NHL, Ovechkin has continued to produce. Despite missing 16 games with a fractured fibula, he ranked third in the league in goals (44) last season and recorded 73 points (44g, 29a) in 65 games. He recorded his 895th career goal in April to pass Wayne Gretzky for the all-time goals record, further cementing his legacy in the sport.<\/p>\n

After taking a vacation in Turkey in June \u2014 complete with a goat on GOAT encounter<\/a> \u2014 Ovechkin and his family have spent most of the summer in Moscow. He brought both the puck and stick from his historic 895th goal<\/a> back home with him, where he eventually plans to display them in his own museum.<\/p>\n

Back in the States, Ovechkin appeared on the cover of Washingtonian magazine<\/a> and won both an ESPY award<\/a> for \u201cBest Record-Breaking Performance\u201d and the 2024-25 Mark Messier Leadership Award<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ovechkin made his first on-ice offseason appearance at the annual \u201cMatch of the Year\u201d charity event in July, where he was gifted a car by the event organizers<\/a>, scored a goal<\/a>, and operated a t-shirt gun like a pro<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He later participated in the \u201cgala match,\u201d held in honor of him reaching the all-time goals record, at the Ovi Cup youth hockey tournament. While Ovechkin might be the NHL\u2019s best goal scorer, his own son Sergei bested him at the friendly<\/a>, recording four goals to Alex\u2019s one.<\/p>\n

In August, Russian tech company Yandex announced they had acquired the rights<\/a> to make a documentary film or series based on Ovechkin\u2019s career. The NHL is also reportedly making a \u201cbig film\u201d<\/a> about Ovechkin, barring him from giving exclusive interviews over the summer.<\/p>\n

Ovechkin still had several media availabilities in Russia despite the NHL\u2019s restrictions, discussing a variety of topics including:<\/p>\n

Ovechkin and the Capitals will look to expand on their their success next season after winning the Eastern Conference in 2024-25 before falling to the Carolina Hurricanes in the second round of the playoffs. Asked about his goals for the campaign, Ovechkin had a simple answer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlay well and try to win the Stanley Cup,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Alex Ovechkin is preparing to make his way back to Washington. Per RIA Novosti, Ovechkin will reportedly return…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":141325,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[293,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-141324","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-nhl","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-united-states","11":"tag-unitedstates","12":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115019282143683288","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=141324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141324\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/141325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=141324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=141324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=141324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}