22-Year-Old Slafkovsky Just Broke Wayne Gretzky's Record and Nobody Saw It Coming
Juraj Slafkovsky walked into Tampa Bay's house and burned it down. The Montreal Canadiens' 22-year-old winger scored three power-play goals, including the overtime winner just 1:22 into the extra frame, to stun the Lightning 4-3 in Game 1 of their first-round series on Sunday night. This wasn't just any playoff performance. Slafkovsky became the youngest player in NHL history to record a hat trick in a postseason opener, passing Wayne Gretzky, who was also 22 when he did it back in 1983.
The Shot That Changed Everything
The No. 1 pick from 2022 made his decision in overtime look simple. Slafkovsky spotted open ice from the left circle and fired a slap shot that screamed past Andrei Vasilevskiy to the far side. "I kind of saw some open space there," he said afterward. "I decided to shoot it, and thankfully, it went in." But here's what makes this even crazier: all three of his goals came on the power play, and one of them was the overtime winner. According to ESPN Research, no player in NHL history has ever done that in a single postseason game. Not Gretzky. Not Lemieux. Slafkovsky did it in his first playoff series appearance.
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The Canadiens weren't leaving anything to chance. Montreal coach Martin St. Louis, a Lightning legend himself, called a timeout during that overtime power play right before the winner. Captain Nick Suzuki explained the call: "Marty just wanted to talk it over and see what we wanted to do. We didn't want to change anything, we had already been out there, but we just wanted to try to end the game." It worked.
Josh Anderson scored for Montreal, and rookie netminder Jakub Dobes made 20 saves in the NHL's first overtime game of the postseason. Brandon Hagel and Darren Raddysh replied for Tampa Bay, but it wasn't enough. The Lightning came into this series as heavy favorites after three straight first-round exits. Game 2 is Tuesday night at Benchmark International Arena, where Tampa Bay has lost eight of its last nine home playoff games. The Canadiens, chasing their first Stanley Cup since 1993, smell blood in the water.
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