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Jordan Binnington got almost as much attention as Alex Ovechkin received after scoring his 900th goal when the goalie was caught stashing the puck in his pants. However, the Blues netminder claims he wasn’t seriously trying to make off with a piece of hockey history after making some waves.
Alex Ovechkin cemented himself as the greatest goal scorer in NHL history when he passed Wayne Gretzky on the all-time list last season. He had some chance to make some more history when he started the current campaign just three goals away from the 900 mark, and on Wednesday, he became the first player to cross that threshold when the Capitals faced off against the Blues.
That tally came at the expense of St. Louis goalie Jordan Binnington, who was captured casually tucking the puck into his pads before a linesman made him cough it up.
Blues goaltender Jordan Binnington tried to keep the puck for Alex Ovechkin’s 900th goal 😅
Gotta respect the effort 😭 pic.twitter.com/g40TrMVglI
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) November 6, 2025
Binnington didn’t exactly have a stellar reputation with NHL fans prior to that point, and his haters were more than happy to use that “incident” as additional ammunition against him. However, he tried to set the record straight by insisting he didn’t seriously intend to keep the memento.
Jordan Binnington denies he was actually trying to steal the puck that Alex Ovechkin used to score the 900th goal of his career
Hockey players tend to keep tabs on imminent milestones on the goal-scoring front, and you’ll frequently see someone swoop in to retrieve the puck from the net when a rookie scores his first one in the NHL or another teammate hits an important achievement.
The Capitals who were sharing the ice with Ovechkin when he scored his 900th got caught up in the excitement by swarming their legendary teammate, but it seems safe to assume someone on the bench realized what Binnington had done before alerting the official who got him to hand it over.
There’s no telling what would have happened if his heist had gone unnoticed, but according to ESPN, Binnington went out of his way to clarify he was just having some fun and fully intended to make sure Ovechkin got another piece to add to the massive collection of memorabilia he’s amassed over the past few decades.
He poked fun at himself for the misfire that kicked off the sequence that led to the goal being scored, saying:
“Yeah, I figured I basically had an assist on the goal there, turning the puck over. Didn’t think he’d mind sharing it. I had full intention to give it back to him…
Incredible play by him to catch that, spin around, and get that on net from a bad angle. Obviously, he’s such a legendary player. Seeing a play like that still happening at his age, it’s next level. He continues to impress.”
There were some conspiracy theorists who floated the possibility of Binnington coming into the game prepared with a decoy puck, but the NHL uses serial numbers to keep track of the biscuits that are put in play and would be able to verify he handed over the one Ovechkin had netted.
As a result, there’s no real reason to think Binnington wouldn’t have actually reunited Ovechkin with the puck at some point.