It was in Washington's 7-3 win over Edmonton that Ovetjkin scored goals number 27, 28, and 29 for the season.
Ovetjkin's first goal of the evening, the 3-1 goal, fell about halfway into the second period, assisted by Canadian Dylan Strome. It has looked like that many times this season - in fact, Strome has set up 16 of Ovetjkin's 29 goals so far this year.
The 4-1 goal came via Ovetjkin's stick in power play just before the second period break - and the hat-trick became a fact when the Washington star scored 7-3 into an empty net at the end of the match.
His hat-trick means that the 39-year-old is now up to 882 NHL goals in total. The Russian is thus approaching Gretzky's goal record of 894 goals.
