Budweiser sends special cans to goalies who Ovechkin never scored against

After Alex Ovechkin’s record-breaking goal on Sunday, Budweiser decided to share a toast with the 28 goalies who never gave up a goal to Ovechkin.

On Monday, the beer company announced its “King of Zero” campaign, sending a customized can of Budweiser Zero to each of the goalies on the elite list.

The cans include the goalie’s jersey number, the number of shots each goalie faced, and a customized written paragraph.

“The most fun part was making the cans in the first place,” said Patrick Heembrock, marketing director for Budweiser. “Just getting into what the designs were and how we can make them feel very hockey and goalie forward.”

Heembrock said the marketing team has had this idea on the backburner since December, knowing that the record would likely be broken this season.

When the day finally came, the team was ready to unveil the creative initiative.

“The vibes of the whole thing is working really well,” Heembrock said. “The response from the general public has been amazing.”

Heembrock added that working with each of the goalies has been “super fun,” given that all 28 are getting some unexpected recognition from one of the biggest days in League history.

“Some of [the goalies] are huge names, but a handful of guys only played a couple seasons or even a couple games, and so all of a sudden being pulled into a big moment like this got a lot of them really excited,” Heembrock said.

Included on the list is former NHL goalie Curtis Joseph, who took to social media with his Budweiser Zero can to congratulate Ovechkin on the achievement.

Ovechkin saw the message and came out of the social media woodworks with a witty response.

Other goalies on the list congratulated Ovechkin on social media, including former All-Star Manny Legace, who stopped all 14 shots he faced from the new record-holder.

“Congratulations Ovi for breaking the record and becoming the greatest goal scorer of all time,” Legace said in a social media video. “I also want to thank you for taking it easy on me. Zero goals and 14 shots in the chest. Congratulations again Ovi, you deserve it.”

One goalie was on the list up until the very end. New York Islanders goalie Ilya Sorokin gave up the record-setting goal on Sunday, the only goal Sorokin has given up to Ovechkin in his career.

To be prepared for every scenario, Heembrock said the marketing team had to make two versions of everything – one with Sorokin’s name on the list and one without.

So yes, there is a can for Sorokin that hasn't seen the light of day.

“We only realized on Friday that Ovi was going up against Sorokin who was on our list, and therefore the whole thing was in limbo,” Heembrock said. “That was a scramble all weekend.”

Circling back to Ovechkin on social media, on Wednesday he apologized to Sorokin for taking away his drink.

The initiative was inspired by a similar Budweiser campaign from 2022 when soccer superstar Lionel Messi broke the record for most goals scored. That time, Budweiser sent bottles to all 160 goalkeepers he scored against.

This time around, Heembrock and his team wanted to try something similar, but with its own flare.

“We thought we needed to do something a little bit more and creative on top of that,” Heembrock said. “So when we saw that stat that there was a handful of goalies that Ovi never scored on, it all just fell into place.”

Only a matter of time before we see what Budweiser brews up next.