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Alex Ovechkin puts on a show with dazzling assist vs. Flyers

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Alex Ovechkin shows off his silky mitts and makes an unreal deke to get past Philippe Myers before dishing the puck to Tom Wilson, who puts it past Carter Hart to give Washington a 2-0 advantage.

We’re only through the first period of Capitals - Flyers, but we’ve already seen vintage Alex Ovechkin ... and even signs of a younger, more spry Ovi. That last version of Ovechkin was on display on a patently absurd set of moves to assist on a Tom Wilson goal.

Update: The good news is that Ovechkin wasn’t finished. After collecting two points in the first period, he added two more. The bad news is that Ovechkin’s four points weren’t enough. Instead, the Flyers won 7-4.

Before that Ovechkin assist, we saw the more typical sniper we’ve become accustomed to. Ovechkin scored the 710th goal of his vaunted NHL career on the power play. It’s a sequence that’s about as close to unstoppable as you can get in the stingy NHL.

As tempted as his critics might be to call Ovechkin a one-trick pony (One-trick Ovi?), the Capitals captain is capable of more than just power-play goals. If you needed evidence, Ovechkin provided it with a dizzying set of dangles to gift-wrap Tom Wilson a goal. Just a tremendous assist by Ovechkin:

Speaking of the Ovechkin we know and love, there was a “Russian Machine Never Breaks” element to all of this. At the 5:46 mark of the first period, it looked like Ovechkin was shaken up by a collision. Instead, Ovechkin returned to action, and then pulled off that assist. Wow.

Through seven games, Ovechkin already had eight points (three goals, five assists). The first period pushed Ovechkin’s totals to four goals and six assists, and he has time to add to those totals.

The Flyers got one goal back to narrow the Capitals’ lead to 2-1 to end the first period. We’ll see if Ovechkin has even more up his sleeves in the second period and beyond.

James O’Brien is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @cyclelikesedins.