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Why Alex Ovechkin’s benching will work in the long run

Bruce Boudreau, Alex Ovechkin

In this age of snap reactions and overreactions, seeing the visceral reaction to what happened with Alex Ovechkin and Bruce Boudreau last night coming from both sides of the fence isn’t stunning. Did Ovechkin cuss out Boudreau? Yeah, he probably did.

After all, when you’re the team’s biggest player and the guy they’ve counted on for years to be “the man” and you’re benched, how would you take it? I know I would’ve been just as angry if not more so.

While it’s fun to speculate about there being player-coach problems and how this could lead to a drama bomb going off in the Caps locker room, the truth here is that this is the kick in the pants that Boudreau felt Ovechkin needed to get the best out of him the rest of the season.

Think about how Ovechkin looks when we see him at his best. He skates with the kind of intensity you rarely see out of anyone in the NHL. He’s a beast on skates playing with the purpose to punish opponents with his powerful goals and physical play.

Last night, we saw neither of those things from Ovechkin. You saw Ovi the dangler, Ovi the passive player, and Ovi the guy on the bench.

We’ll see the Ovechkin of old come back, sooner than later probably, because he’s got pride in how he plays the game. Getting personally embarrassed like that on national television in a game that saw his teammates win without him, we’ll see Ovi the opponents’ nightmare back sooner than you think.

Here are NHL on NBC analysts Mike Keenan and Jeremy Roenick discussing the benching: