Browsing: NHL HOCKEY 🏒

On this day in 2003, the Florida Panthers drafted Alexander Ovechkin unsuccessfully in the 2003 NHL entry draft. Yep, you read that right. So here’s the details; Ovechkin was born on Sept. 17, 1985, 2 days after the cutoff date to be part of the 2003 draft class. The Panthers GM Rick Dudley argued that if it wasn’t for “Leap Year”, Ovechkin would actually be 4 days older than he was. Teams stormed the draft floor in protest and the NHL agreed that Ovechkin was ineligible. The Panthers, in protest of the protest… selected Ovechkin 4 times that draft. The called his name in the 4th, 5th, 6th & 7th rounds. The Panthers still selected other players after being denied Ovechkin each time. The team just wanted it documented several times in hopes of an arbitration hearing and a sub-sequential overturned decision that would never come.

By

The infamous Alexander Ovechkin draft saga. On June 21, 2003, the Florida Panthers made history…