31 years ago today: Hextall becomes the first NHL goalie to shoot & score.

It is a moment that many modern day fans of the National Hockey League will be too young to truly remember, aside from what they may have seen in highlight reels and videos since it happened, but it is a moment that will probably last as long as the National Hockey League remains in business. 

The date is December 8th 1987 and the Broad Street Bullies, the Philadelphia Flyers, are taking on the big bad Boston Bruins. Although this would otherwise be your normal run of the mill game in the National Hockey League unbeknownst to everyone playing in the game, watching in the crowd, and watching at home they are about to witness a historic moment in the National Hockey League. With time winding down and the Bruins desperate to score another goal their goaltender is pulled out of the net and the Bruins go to work on offense, and that is when the magic happens.

Always known as a controversial figure in the NHL Flyers goaltender Ron Hextall was always one for defying the norms of the league and on this fateful night he did it yet again. Seeing a chance at an empty net down the ice Hextall came out of his goal to field a puck, set it firmly on the blade of his goalie stick, and launched it down the ice into the open cage on the Bruins side of the ice. The result was the first goal ever scored by an NHL goaltender, with one possible exception, a truly momentous moment for NHL goaltenders and for Hextall as an individual. 

Now technically it was not the first goal scored by an NHL goaltender as 8 years earlier goaltender Billy Smith of the New York Islanders was credited with a goal, but the circumstances were entirely different. Smith never tried to score the goal himself in the way that Hextall did but instead was credited with the goal when Rob Ramage of the Colorado Rockies put the puck in his own net after Smith had been the last Islanders player to touch the puck on the play. 

Hextall's goal shines as a much different, and much more deliberate play.

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