Last night’s game against the Panthers had some pretty wild bits. The game was played fairly evenly. Shots on goal were almost equal, faceoff wins were almost equal, and the game ended up tied with seconds to go courtesy of our two franchise players, Victor Hedman and Steven Stamkos. Few players in the league have the hands that Stamkos has to one-time a puck from near the goal line and have it go in:
Is it fair? Not really. https://t.co/h492C5Hw3j
— NHL (@NHL) October 19, 2016
After the goal, I turned to the season ticket member that sits next to me and I said, “That’s why Stamkos is always in that spot at the All Star Game.” What I meant was, the All-Star Skills Competition relay event. It includes a one-timer sequence with three players lined up, one at the point, one at the half boards, and one at the goal line. It’s a hard place to shoot from to even hit the net, much less get it past a goalie.
Check out Stamkos doing it at the 2015 All-Star Game:
In the first round of the event, you see Tyler Seguin put two pucks in on the first two attempts. He’s certainly one of the players that has that skill. Skip ahead to 3:07 to see Stamkos make it look easy putting both in with out missing a shot. Skip ahead to 6:20 for the third group with the left handers. It takes Vorachek three attempts to get the puck in. The last group starts at 9:15 with Foligno taking 8 or 9 shots before being mercy ruled and only getting one puck in.
