Alexander Ovechkin Biography

Alexander Ovechkin is the star of the Washington Capitals hockey team. Born in Russia in the fall of 1985, he soon became interested in hockey. His parents have a picture of him, taken as early as two years of age, that features young Alexander in a department store in Moscow wearing a hockey mask and holding a hockey stick. As the story goes, Alexander refused to leave the store until his parents got the hockey equipment for him.

As the Alexander Ovechkin biography continues, the boy grew up fairly normally, playing with his brothers Sergei and Mikhail with normal toys. That is, he played with toys unless a hockey game was playing on TV. Then the toys would be forgotten and young Alexander would watch enraptured as his heroes manuevered the puck skillfully across the ice. Sergei and Alexander also played hockey together. Their parents were also athletes -- Mikhail was a former soccer player, and Tatana had won Olympic gold medals in 1976 and 1980 for women's basketball. In spite of their athletic background, they didn't immediately notice Alexander's natural talent on the ice. However Sergei and the coach of Alexander's hockey school were able to convince Alexander's parents that Alexander needed formal hockey training to further develop his skill.

As Alexander grew, he improved dramatically, and began to set records for his age group. When he was 16 he broke the scoring record set by fellow Russian Ilya Kovalchuk with 14 goals and 4 assists in 8 games, a record that still stands.