NHL: Kaprizov Matches Ovechkin With 14 October Goals, Leads League in Goals

While Russia slept, Minnesota won on the road at Utah 3-1. The game was played overnight into Wednesday, October 28. For the Wild, Joel Eriksson Ek, Kirill Kaprizov and Maxim Shabanov scored; for the hosts, Logan Cooley got one in the 59th minute. But the hero of this story, of course, was not Cooley.

Kaprizov scored his 14th goal of the season, added an assist and took the lead among NHL goal scorers: 23 points (14+9) in 14 games. As recently as Saturday, October 24, he had twelve goals and shared the lead with Draisaitl; in four days he pulled ahead. According to sport24, he became only the second player this century to score 14 goals in a single October: before him, Alexander Ovechkin did it in 2009. The record stood for seventeen years, and now it has been matched. According to sportmail.ru, the all-time October record belongs to Mario Lemieux: 16 goals in 1988.

Minnesota, judging by legalbet.ru, secured first place in the Western Conference after this win. The Wild had one more October game left, at home against the Islanders (October 30, 03:00 Moscow time), but the search has not shown its result yet, so I say nothing about it. And on November 1, Kaprizov meets that very Ovechkin in Washington. Whether the younger man can get past the elder, we will see together. Check the score on nhl.com.