SHARK BEACH

he moves through the crowd like a rock star, trailed by the flotsam of his family and friends. Men in tuxedos stop him, smile, ask for his auto?graph. Women clad in slinky gowns coo at him with a rapturous look in their eyes. His father ushers over two NFL cheerleaders in hot pants and pushes them to?ward his son, who looks at them, his eyes half- lidded with disinterest, tugging on his shirt collar. He is an almost-handsome young man of23, tall,with a Beatles mop ofhair falling over his eyes, a broken nose, a missing front tooth, a stubble of beard. In his black suit, black shirt, and white tie, he looks like a character out of the movie Eastern Promises, as played by Jaws from the Bond flicks. Alexander Ovechkin is here at SneakerBall, held in the Washington, the Penguins to the Flyers' Mike Richards, these new players are being aggressively mar?keted, not only for their talents but also for their larger-than-life personalities. The stakes are high. In the decade sinceWayne Gretzky skated off into the sunset, hockey has been limp?ing toward oblivion. It wasn't that long ago that the sport could legitimately claim its place alongside football, baseball, and bas?ketball, but 2007's Stanley Cup produced record-low ratings for NBC, and the vast major?ity ofgames are shown not on a major network or even ESPN, but on cable's Versus network along with cycling, bull riding, and SlamBall. Can Ovechkin's emergence change all that?
Alex the Great has been called the most dangerous scorer in all ofhockey, and his high?light reels have become YouTube must-sees. As with most prolific scorers, he can strike with a quick flick of his wrists or with a long, arm-sweeping slap shot. Three years ago he scored a goal that's been called the greatest shot ever, against the Gretzky-coached Phoenix Coyotes. Ovechkin was knocked to the ice; he slid on his back past the Coyotes' net; then, while still on his back, he reached his stick be?hind his head and flicked in the puck. Gretzky looked on in disbelief.
"Most skilled scorers are one-dimensional," says Bruce Boudreau, the Capitals' coach. "Alex, at 6'2", 220 pounds, is like a freight train with skills. He's aggressive, but with a deft touch. He can hit you into next week." Most Russian players have a reputation for being passion?less drones, technically proficient but selfish, indifferent, sour,without heart. Boudreau calls them "gloomy," but as teammate Matt Bradley, 30, says, "Alex is the opposite ofmost Russian players. He likes to mix it up."
"I like to hit people," Ovechkin concedes. "I like the dirty work."
Ovechkin says that when he came to Amer?ica at 20, he was "scared...homesick...I leave everything," but still he insisted on rooming with a North American player, not a Russian. "I watch American TV. I want to learn English, be able to talk to people, hang out with team?mates." He flashes his gap-toothed grin and adds, "Talk with American girls, too."
That first year, he spent his free time wan?dering D.C. to "watch beautiful city with lots of memorials.Watch girls, too. I am from Russia. We have fun." Despite press reports of Alex's luxurious mansion full of gorgeous Russian girlfriends, his life was low-key for a sports phenom. Since coming to America, he's lived at various times with his older brother and his parents. His father, Mikhail, a portly white- haired man who drove a taxi in Moscow, is a romanticwho describes hockey as theater. Hisgucci wathces
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Hermes 2011