The Hockey Gods Need To Come Together And Make Sure Joe Pavelski Finally Gets His Name Etched Onto The Stanley Cup
Tom Pennington. Getty Images.Joe Pavelski is what it means to be a hockey player.
In the age of social media where you have to unnecessarily put the puck between your legs and just miss hitting the net in order to get any love from the NHL, Joe Pavelski is a throwback. Maybe because he's been in the league since before social media even existed. But he's a guy who does all the little things. He's a guy who plays the game the right way. He's a guy who was a 7th round draft pick in 2003. But he's also a guy who can put the puck in the back of the net with the best of them, and is now tied for the most career playoff goals scored by any active player in the NHL with 72 (tied with Ovechkin, one more than Crosby).
Joe Pavelski, Alexander Ovechkin, Sidney Crosby. One of those things is not like the others.
He wasn't billed to be some prodigy. 204 players got picked before him in his draft class. Just a good ol' boy from Wisconsin who spent some time playing in the USHL, won an NCAA Championship at Wisconsin, went on to wear the 'C' for a few years in San Jose, had the 'C' on his sweater for Team USA at the World Cup of Hockey, has scored 1000 points in his NHL career, and is currently the best playoff performer the NHL currently has to offer.
People always talk about how loaded the 2003 NHL Draft Class was, but they mostly just stick with the first two rounds. Fleury, Staal, Suter, Phaneuf, Carter, Brown, Parise, Getzlaf, Perry, Burns, Richards, Bergeron, Weber, etc. But some dude named Philippe Dupuis was taken 104th overall by the Columbus Blue Jackets. There was another 100 picks in that draft before Joe Pavelski got his named called. And now that sick bastard just scored 8 goals in a single playoff series as a 38-year-old. And not just any 38-year-old, but a 38-year-old who returned to the playoffs after taking this hit in the first round against Minnesota.
And I said before that I didn't necessarily have a problem with that Dumba hit. That's playoff hockey. But it doesn't change the fact that Pavelski got absolutely obliterated on the play and smacked his head on the ice. That's a hit that could have easily kept someone out for the rest of the playoffs. But not Joe Pavelski. Because Joe Pavelski is a hockey player.
Anyway, the Hockey Gods already dropped the ball when it came to making sure that Joe Thornton got his name on the Cup. They can't do it again this time to Captain America. Joe Pavelski deserves to be a Stanley Cup Champion, and now the Dallas Stars are just 8 more wins away from making it happen.