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The New York Rangers found out that, sometimes, desperate times call for serious desperate measures, as they found themselves panicking and looking for a backup goaltender during last night’s game against the Minnesota Wild.
With the game’s starter, Antti Raanta, getting sent to the locker room after taking a fucking slap shot to the mask and regular starter Henrik Lundqvist given the night off, the Rangers were left scurrying for a second goalie to save themselves should Lundqvist go down for some reason.
So, naturally, they called a semi-pro netminder named Santino Vasquez, who was actually watching the game from his fucking couch when the puck dropped, no joke.
Per the St. Paul Pioneer Press, here’s how Vasquez told the story:
“I live like two minutes away over the bridge. I just grabbed all my (stuff) and got down here.”
Vasquez, 26, spent the next two-plus hours sequestered in an auxiliary room across from the Rangers’ dressing room, dressed in hockey undergarments wondering whether he would be summoned for the moment of a lifetime and New York’s greatest nightmare.
“I was just in here stretching, just hanging out, staying relaxed,” he said. “I don’t really get too nervous. I’ve been down here a lot. I would have been ready to play, that’s for sure. I know they wouldn’t have scored on me every shot.”
Since there’s a rule that states that the home team must give an opposing squad an emergency backup goalie, a coach from the Wild made the call—which, in the end, was just for precautionary reasons since Vasquez never actually subbed in.
Oh, but had he gotten in there, ol’ dude was confident in himself, per St. Paul Pioneer Press sports columnist Brian Murphy’s Twitter:
You’ve got to love the confidence.
[H/T FTW.USAToday, St. Paul Pioneer Press]
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