I Love Ice Hockey
especially playing goalie
Jacques Plante (Montreal Canadiens)
Credit: Montreal Gazette
Did You Know?
The first National Hockey League (NHL) goalie to wear a mask full-time was Jacques Plante of the Montreal Canadiens; he wore a face-hugging fibreglass mask created by Bill Burchmore beginning in 1959.
Goaltending is an extreme sport inside an extreme sport: Your job is to go out on the ice and repeatedly get in the way of a frozen hard-rubber disc that moves faster than anything you directly interact with in your normal life.
There's a myth about hockey goalies, one Chris Koentges's story here in The Atlantic this month both entertains and questions: that we are insane. When Koentges asks the Finnish goaltending legend Upi Ylönen whether there's any truth to the myth, Ylönen snaps. "Hey, hey, hey!" he says. "Good habits or bad habits, goalies need to be able ... to live in the present situation. Whatever happens, they need to be able to live in the present situation. A goalie only lives from moment to moment. He can't hold on."