Capitals PR Team Says Email Sent To Ticket Holders About Next Season Being Alex Ovechkin's Last Is Inaccurate

Things escalated quickly for the Washington Capitals on Thursday.

Just after 7 a.m. on the East Coast, an email reportedly hit the inbox of season ticket holders, appearing to show a calendar of events for the coming months. The bullet point for October did not just promote the start of a new season, but mentioned that it was "Alex Ovechkin's FINAL NHL SEASON."

Ovechkin retiring after next season wouldn't be a shock to anyone, but he's yet to address his future plans, making the email to season ticket holders a major surprise. Ovi will turn 40 in September, and his current contract expires after the 2025-26 season as well before he hits the market as an unrestricted free agent.

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More than five hours after screenshots of the email and rumors ran rampant, the Capitals PR team took to X to clear the air, stating that someone in the corporate sales department mistakenly alluded to next season being Ovechkin's last.

Unfortunately, it's probably safe to assume that the individual with the corporate sales department no longer works in said corporate sales department. One can't just fire off an email to thousands of folks falsely, or prematurely, letting them know one of the greatest athletes of his entire generation is calling it quits after the upcoming season.

Ovechkin became the NHL's all-time leading goalscorer this past season after scoring 44 goals in 65 regular-season games, leaving him with 897 tallies over the course of 1,491 regular-season games played in his career. Ovi has scored at least 40 goals in 14 of his 20 seasons in the NHL.

Wayne Gretzky held the NHL goal-scoring record for decades with 894 goals to his name.