Stalock skates to the blueline to play the puck and almost destroys his assistant coach

Minnesota Wild goaltender Alex Stalock earned his 5th career shutout earlier today with an impressive 2-0 victory over the Ottawa Senators. But after the game it wasn’t Stalock’s saves that were making the highlight reels, it was an aggressive play that the netminder made early in the third period.

With Sens newcomer Vladislav Namestnikov chasing down a loose puck and looking at a potential breakaway, Stalock came SCREAMING out of his crease to clear the puck away and fired it… DIRECTLY into his team’s own bench. In fact, one of the Wild’s assistant coaches narrowly avoided taking the puck right in the face.

Check it out:

HEADS UP!

All kidding aside, that was a smart, smart play by Stalock. He KNEW he had the chance to get to that puck first and by putting the puck off the glass and not over the glass, he avoided taking a two minute delay of game penalty. 

Smart hockey.