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My Elevator Ride with Ovechkin. |
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With all the Ovechkin talk out there, I thought I would share my favorite moment that I personally had with OV. It was pretty basic, but I really believe it shows a side of the guy people might not expect….also just how dedicated he is to his teammates…
This story was 5 or so years ago…
It was this weird, ice stormy night in Philly in late September, and the Washington Capitals were in for a preseason game. It was something close to their third game in three nights… the last two of which were played away from home, so the team hadn’t gone back to Washington in between. Ovechkin wasn’t with them on the trip because he was nursing some kind of small injury, so no one expected him to be in Philly for such a nothing game on such a lousy night.
I had left a notebook in the media meal room, so about 15 minutes before game time, I was back on the elevator down to ice level to get my notebook and then back up the elevator to the sky level where the press box is.
Getting back on the elevator to go up, I was quickly joined by Alex Ovechkin and two other guys he was with. I’m not sure if they were Capital rookies or friends of his. Alex said, something like, “hey guys. No one sees me. I drove up. Just in time.”
I was kind of shocked. The Great 8 himself had driven his car to Philly on I-95 from Washington in an ice storm just to be at this preseason game in the press box and support their teammates. The weather was so bad that most of the arena was empty of fans.
I remember Al Morganti was also in the elevator with me . Ovechkin and the two other players were taking off their wool hats as the doors closed. The ice pellets were still sticking to their jackets..
I said to Alex, “You drove all the way up here in this weather?”
He replied, “Yeah, probably not smartest.”
There was a bit of a laugh in the elevator, and I said, “Impressive.”
OV smiled as if to say, “No Biggie.”
And that was it.
A quick moment in time, but a moment that I felt shows so much what Alexander Ovechkin is personally about.
At that point, he was heading into his 15th year, he was a superstar, but he was also a teammate. The team didn’t ask him to make the trip up, but he wanted to be there for his teammates. So despite the fact they were playing in Washington again in two nights, he took it upon himself to drive over three hours through horrible weather so he could be there for an absolutely meaningless preseason game.
And no one knew about it. He didn’t make a big deal about it. He just did it.
That’s class in my opinion… it’s not every day you can see a superstar that gets it. OV gets it.
With character like his, it’s very easy to be happy for him setting this new record.
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