All Old Warriors Are Cold Warriors
As the NHL's Russian superstar closes in on Wayne Gretzky's goal scoring record, Glen Sather utters a feeling I suspect plenty of other Canadians share.
It’s been a while since we checked in on the NHL’s Washington Capitals. In fact, it’s been more than six months since, after a flurry of off-season activity, I wrote that the 2024-25 version of the team was a lock to qualify for the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
What I couldn’t have dreamed of at the time was that just past the halfway mark of the NHL season, the Capitals would sit atop not only the NHL’s Eastern Conference by a comfortable margin, but after an incredible first half, would have to be considered to be one of the best, if not the best, team in all of professional ice hockey.
There are plenty of ways the organization followed through on a promise it made to superstar Alex Ovechkin that it would do what was needed to keep the team competitive as the Russian superstar continued his assault on Wayne Gretzky’s all-time NHL goal scoring record. It’s clear that Ovechkin has been energized, scoring 21 goals and 33 points in just 30 games, including a game-winning overtime goal on Friday night in Ottawa that gave the Caps a 1-0 victory. All the more incredible, Ovechkin has done it after missing six weeks due to a tibial fracture he suffered in December in a game against the Utah Hockey Club. In the nine games he’s played since his return, Ovechkin has scored four times, including Friday game winner.
Which means that what was once considered first to be impossible, then improbable, is now all but inevitable: Ovechkin will eclipse Gretzky as the greatest goal scorer in the history of the NHL. It’s not a question of if, it’s a question of when.
As I write this, Ovechkin needs 20 goals to tie the “Great One,” and 21 to pass him. As his tally has climbed ever higher, we’ve heard grumblings from time to time, mostly from the Canadian hockey press, that not everyone is happy about seeing a Russian snatch the mantle of the game’s greatest goal scorer from not only the greatest ice hockey player who ever lived, but one of the greatest Canadians who ever lived.
The latest critique comes from a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame, retired player, head coach and front office executive, Glen Sather. He coached Gretzky for ten seasons with the Edmonton Oilers, winning four Stanley Cups. On Thursday night, Sather was interviewed by Sportsnet’s Elliote Friedman and Kyle Bukauskas on a live edition of their 32 Thoughts podcast that was recorded in Cranmore, Alberta where the hockey world had decamped for the annual “Hockey Day in Canada” celebration.
Sather, a hockey lifer who knows just about anybody who is anybody in the game, is a great interview. And after spending a few minutes sharing some absolute gems with his hosts, Sather strayed without prompting onto more controversial territory after spinning some yarns about his time with Gretzky and the Oilers.
I hope that his [Gretzky’s] record isn’t broken … And for a lot of reasons. The game is different than it was then. There was all kinds … Wayne had to quit because his back was so bad. Guys would cross-check him after he scored a goal.1 And the way that Ovechkin is, he’s a superhuman being. He’s like 245 pounds of solid muscle. And I just don’t want to see it go to a Russian.
Sather’s comments was met with stunned silence.
After a few moments there was some murmuring, Sather continued:
Does everybody agree or not? A lot of guys probably won’t say that. I’m sure Wayne won’t say that. They say records are to be broken, but as far as I’m concerned that one shouldn’t be broken.
Sather was met with some tepid applause, after which his hosts seemed more than happy to change the subject. I have some thoughts of my own …
There are a lot of big stories in hockey this season, but there’s none bigger than Ovechkin’s pursuit of Gretzky. Anyone who argues differently needs to have their head examined. I vividly remember Hank Aaron’s pursuit of Babe Ruth as well as the season where Barry Bonds chased Aaron for the all-time lead in home runs in Major League Baseball. Ovechkin’s chase is just as momentous for the NHL.
In terms of news value, Sather’s take was a fat pitch laid over the center of the plate.2 There are all sorts of directions that Friedman and Bukauskas could have taken the conversation, directions that could have proven to be incredibly illuminating. Failing to follow up was a missed opportunity.
I’m sure that as Sather looks back at his career, that there was no more consequential professional relationship in his life than the one he enjoyed with Gretzky. That Sather would blanche at the prospect of another player snatching away a record that was set by someone that he personally mentored shouldn’t be a surprise. In fact, it would have been a surprise if he wasn’t.
Sather has vivid memories of how international ice hockey and the Cold War intersected in the 1970s and 1980s as the Russian ice hockey program birthed by Anatoly Tarasov and bequeathed to Viktor Tikhonov dominated the international game. It’s difficult to underestimate just how much this burned our Canadian friends.
In 1972, when Team Canada clashed with the Russians in the famous eight-game “Summit Series,” Sather was already a veteran of six NHL seasons who had played with or against every member of Team Canada. The event passed without much notice in the USA, but Canada was riveted by the series from the start. An estimated 16 million Canadians out of a population of 21.5 million watched the deciding game on the CBC, a 4-3 win for Team Canada.
It isn’t hyperbole to say that the win, which was clinched with a late goal by Team Canada’s Paul Henderson, might have been Canada’s most profound contribution to victory in the Cold War.
In 1984, a few months after Sather led the Oilers to their first Stanley Cup, he coached Gretzky and Team Canada to victory in the Canada Cup, a run that included a 3-2 overtime win over the Soviet Union in the semi-finals.
While patriotism might be out of fashion in some precincts, can anyone blame a proud Canadian like Sather to be disappointed that the most consequential record in Canada’s national sport will no longer be held by a countrymen? I’ve watched Ovechkin score goals for two decades and I’m rooting for him to break Gretzky’s record as soon as possible. But when I try to put myself in Sather’s shoes, I can hardly blame him.
I don’t think Sather is the only Canadian who feels this way. Perhaps most are just too polite to say it. My Canadian friends ought to feel free to express that opinion openly.
Ovechkin’s pursuit of Gretzky has become known as the “GR8 Chase.” Coincidentally, it resumes tomorrow night in Edmonton as the Capitals visit the Oilers. I’ll be cheering him on, even as others begrudge his success. Game on.
Gretzky wasn’t the only hockey great that was forced into retirement because his back had been subjected to one too many crosschecks. New York Islanders great Mike Bossy was forced to retire after the 1986-87 season thanks to his bad back. That last season was the only one in his career where he failed to score 50 or more goals (38).
In a hit tip to sports radio talk show host Jim Rome, it was a take and it didn’t suck.