Kris Russell sets a painful NHL record.

There are the kind of National Hockey League records that will never be broken and then there are the kind of NHL records that no one wants to break. This is definitely one of the latter.

On Saturday the Edmonton Oilers faced off against the Las Vegas Golden Knights in what was otherwise your typical regular season game, but for veteran defenseman Kris Russell it was anything but. Coming into the game Russell need just 2 blocked shots to tie former NHL defenseman Brent Seabrook for the all time record for blocked shots in the NHL.

Seabrook had a staggering 1,999 blocked shots to his credit and while that may sound like way too much pain for any one man to handle, Russell has now surpassed it.

Not only did Russell managed to tie the record on Saturday night but he surpassed it, and he needed almost no time to do it. Russell may very well have come into this contest determined to etch his name into the NHL record books because in the first 10 minutes of the game he had already blocked 3 shots, putting him at 2,000 career blocked shots and giving him sole possession of a grueling NHL record.

It isn't the kind of record that fans will be talking about for years to come and it certainly won't put him in the conversation with all time greats like Wayne Gretzky, Gordie Howe, and Mario Lemieux, but it is something that Russel can be proud of and even something he should be admired for doing. I think there are very few people out there who would willingly sign up to be hit by over 2,000 hockey pucks, fired by professional level hockey players no less, regardless of how much money the job offered.

Russell is signed a one year deal with the Oilers in the offseason and while he is no doubt on the tail end of his career he continues to be a relatively regular fixture on the Oilers blue line with 9 appearances under his belt this season. No doubt he will continue to add to his record breaking totals throughout the season, and perhaps even in seasons beyond this one.