Hurricanes clinch playoff berth, applaud Ovechkin moving closer to Gretzky record

RALEIGH, N.C. -- It was a best-of-everything night that the Carolina Hurricanes will remember for a long time.

They won 5-1 against the Washington Capitals at Lenovo Center on Wednesday.

They clinched a berth in the Stanley Cup Playoffs for the seventh straight season.

And they were witness to Alex Ovechkin scoring a goal to get him closer to a record previously thought to be unbreakable, only it didn't come at the expense of anything they were trying to accomplish.

"There you go," Hurricanes forward Seth Jarvis said. "I mean, it's only a matter of time. He's in a spot 5-on-3, you can almost count that before it happens. Thankfully, we're not the final goal. Yeah, you don't like getting scored on, but that was a little bit of a cool moment."

Ovechkin scored his 892nd goal on a 5-on-3 power play at 19:25 of the second period to cut Carolina's lead to 4-1. He was open at the top of the left circle, got the puck from defenseman Jakob Chychrun and hammered a one-timer under goalie Frederik Andersen's glove.

"You give him that shot, he's probably going to score," Andersen said. "I think pretty much everyone knew that was going in. That's the cool part about his shot and his gift of scoring."

The Capitals forward needs two goals to tie and three to break Wayne Gretzky's all-time goals record of 894. He'll continue his chase at history against the Chicago Blackhawks at home on Friday (7 p.m.ET; CHSN, MNMT, NHLN, SN, TVAS).

"Rightfully so, there's a lot of attention on him right now and their team," Andersen said. "He's been a heck of a player for 20 years now so that stuff is all deserving and all the attention he's getting is great. But we have a job to do and our focus on this game was to come in and play our game against a really good opponent. It's not like they're just playing for him to score. They're playing for them and they're a great team. We came out really hard and got rewarded right away and got a commanding lead. It got a little silly at the end, but just happy to clinch. That's what we talked about. This is the first race. You've got to punch your ticket to get a shot at it."

Ovechkin finished with four shots on goal. Other than his goal, his best chance came at 1:45 of the second period, when Connor McMichael set him up to be alone in front of Andersen, 1-on-1, but the goalie made a save between his left arm and his body.

Otherwise, the Hurricanes limited his chances and his looks, including on Washington's four power plays, with the 5-on-3 being the exception.

"Didn't love the calls on that to give them the 5-on-3 to be honest, but you know, that's just the classic way he scores," Carolina coach Rod Brind'Amour said. "We've seen a hundred of those here basically in that exact same spot. You've got to give him credit, he's the best to ever play to score in that spot."

It didn't hurt the Hurricanes because they scored three times in a stretch of 7:07 in the first period, including two on the power play, before Logan Stankoven made it 4-0 at 9:27 of the second.

That the Capitals didn't strike again after the 5-on-3 goal made it easy for the Hurricanes to accept the fact that they gave another one up to Ovechkin.

It was his 52nd goal against them, including 32 in 46 games at Lenovo Center. It was his 10th goal in 13 games against Andersen.

"Have you really played in the NHL if you haven't gotten scored on by Ovi?" Andersen said.

The Hurricanes aren't done with Ovechkin yet, though. They'll see him again on April 10, when they go to Washington. Ovechkin has two games to score three goals before then for the Hurricanes to avoid being the team that could give up No. 895.

"He's going to get it," Brind'Amour said. "It's just a matter of time."