Bench Life Sports

Pekka Rinne got to live out every goalie’s dream on Thursday night. With time winding down in the third period of Nashville’s game against the Chicago Blackhawks, Rinne controlled the puck behind his own net and launched it down towards an open net. The rest, as they say, is history.

I’m not sure what’s more impressive about this goal: controlling the puck with his skate and kicking it up to his stick, or the balls it took to send the puck flying down the middle of the ice from behind his own net. Either way, Rinne’s goal marked the first one scored by a goalie since Mike Smith did it on October 19, 2013.

Twelve different goalies have scored a total of fifteen goals in NHL games, with Billy Smith being credited with the first one back in 1979. However, just 8 of those 15 goals were the result of an intentional shot by a goalie. The others were own goals by a team where the goalie was the last player to touch the puck and is automatically credited with the goal in that situation.

Martin Brodeur (3) and Ron Hextall (2) are the only two goalies to have scored multiple goals throughout their NHL careers, but Mike Smith is the only goalie to have scored a goal in the ECHL and the NHL.

After the goal, Twitter was quick to point out that Rinne now has more goals this season than a handful of NHL players.

Unfortunately for those who have Rinne as their goalie in a fantasy hockey league, there was some bad news for this one.

As a goalie myself, there were two things that I always thought would be the coolest things that could happen on the ice. The first would obviously be scoring a goal, and the second would be to get in a goalie fight. While Rinne seems to be pretty calm in the crease, I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on him the rest of the season to see if he drops the mitts and officially becomes my favourite goalie in the NHL (that doesn’t play for the Bruins).