At Least He Got The Puck

I've been patiently waiting for the MJHL's Selkirk Steelers to do right by one of their players and post a highlight. Normally, I'm not seeking out highlights from the MJHL because I don't want to single out provincial junior programs in any province, but when something as fantastic as a goalie scoring a goal happens, that's my cue to start looking for video anywhere and everywhere on the internet. With every team and league having websites where video can be posted, I normally don't have to dig too deeply to find the highlight I seek, but it seems the Steelers have failed their netminder in having video evidence of one of the coolest things in hockey. Let's dig into this.

I was notified by a friend that Saturday's game between the Selkirk Steelers and Niverville Nighthawks being played at the Selkirk Recreational Complex in Selkirk, Manitoba had an exciting moment in the final seconds of the game. It seems that Steelers netminder Noel Olsonawski had fired the puck down the ice and into the Niverville net to make the score 5-2 in favour of Selkirk late in the third period.

Sure enough, the boxscore shows that story to be fact.

Seeing as how Noel Olsonawski added his name to the fraternity of goal-scoring netminders, there had to be a highlight of his goal somewhere that I would proudly post here because goalie goals are awesome and Olsonawski deserves some spotlight for doing something not many goalies do. I waited for the Steelers to post something to their social media options - Twitter (no, I'm not calling it X), Instagram, Facebook, whatever - but no video of the actual puck being sent down the ice by Olsonawski emerged on any of the Steelers' social media.

Casually, I urged the Steelers via social media to get the video evidence of Olsonawski's goal posted because it's a big moment in his career. They responded to my urging in a rather odd way.

Camera issues? What exactly is happening out in Selkirk? FloHockey takes care of the video stream, so what happened during the stream? Did it just go off the air? Did it never make it to air?

It seems that the internet feed that comes in and out of the Selkirk Recreational Complex may be the culprit in denying us a look at Noel Olsonawski's goal as shown in the Twitter exchange below.

Why not just say that they had internet problems on Saturday night which affected the video? Why did they blame camera issues as the problem when it seems the entire feed for the game via FloHockey was affected based on the comment by "MB Hockey Watcher"?

Anyway, it's been three days and there has been video that has surfaced through the Selkirk Steelers or the MJHL, so I guess Noel Olsonawski's video proof of the goal has been lost to the gremlins that live inside the walls at the Selkirk Recreational Complex. For the reported 281 fans, in attendance at the game, they saw something no one else ever will when it comes to Noel Olsonawski scoring a goal, so kudos to them for being at the Selkirk Recreational Complex on Saturday night to witness one of the rarer plays in hockey!

If I'm searching for positives here, the image to the right is one of them as Olsonawski got the puck that ended up in the Niverville net after he had shot it. Seeing him with the big grin and holding that puck makes me happy. Selkirk Steelers fans were also a happy bunch on that night having witnessed the goal and seeing their team earn a 5-2 win over the Nighthawks. Selkirk was trailing the Nighthawks in the standings by a double-digit point total, but this closed the gap a little before the holiday break. They still have a ways to go, though, as the Steelers now sit in ninth-place out of 13 MJHL teams in the standings. Olsonawski, for the record, improved to 8-10-0 on the season with the win, and he now leads all MJHL goalies in goals which is a pretty awesome statistic to own! Will he add more this season? We'll find out!

We don't have video proof, but the boxscore and a picture of Noel Olsonawski holding the puck that he shot down the ice into the vacant net of the opposing team is enough proof for me that a goalie goal was scored. Congratulations, Noel, on that awesome achievement, and may it be the first of many in your career!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!