Biden administration wanted to ban Alex Ovechkin and other Russians from NHL

An expose article published by the Wall Street Journal this past week revealed that White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan was in favor of banning some of the NHL's biggest Russian stars from the league in an effort to put pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin to withdraw his forces from Ukraine.

“The administration needed to explore alternative trades that wouldn’t include the murderer or other ways to pressure the Kremlin,” the reporting reads. “Sullivan had considered punishing Putin by expelling Russian hockey players in America, including Alexander Ovechkin, the NHL star chasing who was Wayne Gretzky’s all-time scoring record. He ultimately decided against it.”

The ban on Russian players would have meant that Ovechkin would have been shelved for at least last season, which would have halted his goal total 41 goals behind Gretzky... indefinitely.

It also means that other Russian stars would have been unavailable to their teams, as well. Do the Florida Panthers repeat as Stanley Cup champions without Sergei Bobrovsky? How would the Tampa Bay Lightning have fared without Nikita Kucherov or Andrei Vasilevsky? Artemi Panarin, Kirill Kaprizov, Andrei Svechnikov... the list of Russian impact players goes on and on.