Advertisement

Alex Ovechkin suffers second 5-goal elimination loss in a week; has fractured foot

After being bounced in the first round by the New York Rangers with a 5-0 loss in Game 7, Alex Ovechkin was upset. He was text-his-coach-upwards-of-20-times upset, which is, like, super upset.

But with the World Championships in full swing, there was an opportunity for quick redemption, so Ovechkin jumped on a plane to Helsinki to join Russia for the quarterfinals, hoping to put the five-goal elimination loss behind him.

In this, he was unsuccessful. On Thursday, Ovechkin saw the same result on the other side of the Atlantic, as Team Russia was eliminated from the tournament with an 8-3 loss to Team USA.

It was painful, especially towards the end. After the Russians trimmed the lead to 5-3, they fell apart completely. The Americans scored three times in 116 seconds to put this one away:

Deja 'vechkin, amirite? Har har har.

It was a historic loss for the Russians, who had never surrendered more than five goals to the Americans prior to this one.

You've got to feel for Ovechkin. Not only did he lose the last two games of the year by five goals each, but his KHL team during the lockout, Dynamo Moscow, won the Gagarin Cup without him.

Eliminated twice in a week in five-goal losses. The team that lost him won the championship. It's enough to make a man think he's the problem.

But lest you think the recipe for success is to be minus Ovechkin, the Capitals' winger was named Russia's best player in the loss, with a goal and an assist. So there's that.

UPDATE: Via the Washington Post, more Ovechkin news. He played on a fractured foot in Games 6 and 7 against the Rangers, and one assumes in this IIHF game as well:

In the first period of Game 6, Ovechkin blocked two shots by Rangers’ defenseman Ryan McDonagh. The first shot, at 14:29 of the first, struck his left foot. Replay of the game shows Ovechkin hesitant to get up after that block. Skating could not make the injury worse, the source said, so Ovechkin played with it through the rest of Game 6 and Game 7 against the Rangers. The fracture will only require rest to heal, the source said.

Follow Harrison Mooney on Twitter at @HarrisonMooney