Shayne Gostisbehere did something last night he has yet to do this entire season: have a multi-goal game. Sure, he’s had two-point games before – six of them, to be exact – but in the Flyers‘ 4-2 win over the Tampa Bay Lightning, Ghost gave us our first look at wondering if we were about to see a hat trick.
Via the Elias Sports Bureau, Inc., it’s the first time a rookie Flyers defenseman has had a multi-goal game since 2003-04, when Joni Pitkanen and Jim Vandermeer had a few multi-goal games between them.
Pitkanen only scored eight goals in his rookie season, though. And Vandermeer only had three with the Flyers in a season that just barely technically counted as his rookie year.
Gostisbehere has 14 goals this season, passing Behn Wilson’s rookie tally of 13. That puts him ninth overall in rookie goal scoring this year; the next highest defenseman on the list is Colton Parayko who has seven, and that’s with 17 more games played.
Gostisbehere is currently on pace for 19 goals this season – but hopefully he can make that an even 20.
Here’s a list of defensemen who have scored 20+ goals in their rookie seasons:
- Dion Phaneuf, 20 in 82 games, 2005-06 season
- Barry Beck, 22 in 75 games, 1977-78 season
- Mark Howe, 24 in 74 games, 1979-80 season
- Brian Leetch, 23 in 68 games, 1988-89 season
Gostisbehere can only play a maximum of 64 games this season, so that’s fewer games than all the above names listed – and three of the four played in completely different eras. And all he has to do to join that group is step up his current pace just a little.
Fingers crossed, because this is definitely a rookie season for the ages.
