Geoff Burke-Imagn Images
No NHL player has won the Maurice “Rocket” Richard Trophy more times than Alex Ovechkin, who has secured it at the end of the nine different seasons he’s led the league in goals. He almost had to share it with Leon Draisaitl in 2019, and he went out of his way to thank an opposing player who helped him end the year in sole possession of first place.
In 1999, the NHL decided to whip up a new trophy to honor the players who score the most goals over the course of the regular season and named it after Maurice “Rocket” Richard, the Canadiens legend who did exactly that five times during his Hall of Fame career.
Teemu Selanne was the first recipient after getting 47 goals during the 1998-99 campaign, and nine years later, Alex Ovechkin earned the honor for the first time after notching 65 of them during his third season with the Capitals.
The nature of the trophy means it’s possible for more than one player to receive it if they end up tied when everything is said and done, and that’s happened three times since its inception: 2003 (Jarome Iginla, Ilya Kovalchuk, and Rick Nash all had 41), 2010 (Sidney Crosby and Steve Stamkos put up 51), and 2020 (Ovechkin and David Pastrnak each had 48 during the COVID-shortened season).
Ovechkin was the sole winner in 2019 with 51 goals, but he had some stiff competition courtesy of Leon Draisaitl, the Oilers center who headed into the final game of the regular season with 49 under his belt and only needed one more to tie Ovi after scoring against the Flames in the first period of that showdown.
Calgary pulled the goalie down 3-1 toward the end of the third period, and there was around 50 seconds left when Draisaitl lobbed a shot from center ice that seemed like it was going to end up in the goal before Flames defenseman Rasmus Andersson batted it down with a high stick to keep his team’s slim hopes alive (Edmonton would ultimately prevail by the same score.
That meant Ovechkin didn’t have to share his eighth Rocket Richard Trophy, and he went out of his way to thank Andersson for his contribution to the cause, as Eric Francis of SportsNet shared some photos of the autographed stick the Capitals star gave the d-man for helping him out.
This is the stick I spoke about on the broadcast, which Alex Ovechkin gave to Rasmus Andersson in Washington for playing a role in securing Ovie’s Rocket Richard Trophy in 2019. pic.twitter.com/Rk4Z2a6Zcy
— Eric Francis (@EricFrancis) March 1, 2025
You’ve got to respect the gesture (and the pettiness).