The Pittsburgh Penguins shot themselves in their webbed feet with an unbelievable own goal in their game against the Arizona Coyotes at Mullett Arena on Monday night.
Lawson Crouse received credit for the bizarre goal, which came with the Coyotes on the power play at the 4:10 mark of the third period. Crouse’s 18th goal of the season made it 4-2 Arizona.
The Penguins had drawn a penalty in the Coyotes’ defensive zone moments earlier, with Jason Zucker slated to head to the box for hooking as soon as Arizona touched the puck. As is customary in the NHL, Pittsburgh elected to pull goaltender Tristan Jarry for an extra attacker during the delayed penalty.
Pittsburgh ended up taking possession of the puck in the neutral zone before ragging it back into their defensive end while looking for a route up the ice. With the Coyotes putting on an aggressive forecheck, Kris Letang dropped the puck back to a trailing Evgeni Malkin standing beside Jarry’s vacated crease.
Only one problem: Malkin bobbled the pass from Letang and ended up redirecting the puck into his own net.
Own goals during delayed penalty calls are rare but certainly not unheard of in the NHL. It’s happened many times, including when Loui Eriksson did so against the Calgary Flames in his Vancouver Canucks home debut back in 2016.
In even rarer instances, a goaltender has received credit for an own goal “scored” by the opposing team. Although the last four NHL goalie goals have come as a result of a goaltender shooting the puck into the other net, both Martin Brodeur and Cam Ward were credited with goals in the early 2010s for being the last player to touch the puck before the other team scored on themselves.
In this case, it was Crouse who briefly touched the puck with both his stick and his head in the Coyotes’ defensive zone before Pittsburgh’s big guns scored at the wrong end of the ice. Crouse had gone four games without a goal entering Monday’s action.
The play counted as a power-play goal for the Coyotes, who had not previously managed a single shot during their three PP chances in the game. In fact, the play went into the record books as a goal but not a shot, meaning that Arizona went 1-for-3 with zero shots on the power play against Pittsburgh.
The Coyotes defeated the Penguins by a 5-2 score on Monday night, with Nick Bjugstad, Jason Zucker, Juuso Välimäki, and Alex Kerfoot tallying the other goals by far less noteworthy means. Prior to Monday’s game, the Penguins had not suffered a regulation loss to Arizona in their last 14 meetings.
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