Pittsburgh Penguins superstar forward Sidney Crosby isn’t very popular around the NHL fan bases outside of Pittsburgh. Needless to say, he still isn’t well liked around Detroit stemming from the 2008 and 2009 Stanley Cup Finals, the latter of which resulted in Crosby and the Penguins raising the Cup on Detroit’s home ice.
He’s accomplished just about everything there is to accomplish – he’s a three-time Stanley Cup champion, two-time gold medal winner, a six-time All Star, and two-time NHL MVP. However, if there was still one thing left he’d like to do, it would be playin goalie.
During an interview on the Dan Patrick Show, Crosby said he’d love to get in between the pipes and try his hand at stopping the puck, rather than scoring.
“I told them if anything ever happened, I’d love to get the nod,” Crosby said. “I’d love to be able to play one game in the NHL. We’ll see, there’s still some time left if it ever came down to it. That’d be pretty cool.”
He was then asked who he’d prefer to face 1-on-1, and his answer was the one player that most goaltenders dreaded facing in that situation – former former Red Wings star Pavel Datsyuk.
“He’s made so many goalies look bad,” Crosby said. “If I could somehow find a way to get my pad on it or stop him, he seems like one of the best shootout guys that there was so on a breakaway, he’d be pretty good.”
Photo Credit: Mel/FlickrBefore Crosby became known as one of the top players in the world, his original dream was to be a goalie and follow in the footsteps of his father, who was drafted into the NHL but never saw action.
“He told me that it’s not fun. You just stand there,” he said. “You’re not around the puck very much. It’s true as a kid, as a goalie you’re not really involved. Everyone is kind of chasing the puck its going everywhere so he convinced me not to. It was something I probably liked more as a young kid with all the gear and stuff like that.”
Datsyuk retired from the NHL in 2016 and returned to his native Russia where he currently plays in the KHL.
