TORONTO — When Roberto Luongo left the ice at Scotiabank Arena on Sunday, a reporter asked him a serious question: What was the most memorable moment of his hockey career?
Luongo gave a not-so-serious answer on a not-so-serious afternoon.
“Scoring two goals today,” Luongo said.
Luongo will enter the Hockey Hall of Fame on Monday for keeping the puck out of the net, but the goalie-turned-center put the puck in the net twice in a 10-6 win for Team Lindros against Team Sundin in the Hyundai Hockey Hall. of Fame Legends Classic.
“It was fun,” Luongo said. “I was looking forward to this game the whole time. When they asked me to play, I said I didn’t want to be in net, but they gave me a chance.”
It’s funny. Growing up in Montreal, Luongo didn’t start playing hockey until he was 8 years old. And when he did start, he played forward despite his desire to be a goalie because his parents wanted him to get exercise and felt goalies didn’t move around enough.
Then when he was 11 or 12, Luongo was cut by a travel team.
Only when the goalie on his home team got sick did his mother relent and allow him in the net. He wound up getting a shutout and never went back up front.
The rest is history.
Luongo went on to rank second among goalies in NHL history in games played (1,044), fourth in wins (489) and ninth in shutouts (77). Among those who have played at least 250 games, he’s tied for sixth in save percentage (.919) Andrei Vasilevskiy of the Tampa Bay Lightning.
Luongo received his Hockey Hall of Fame blazer in a pregame ceremony Sunday. Then he dropped the puck for the ceremonial face-off, flanked by two of his former Vancouver Canucks teammates and fellow Class of 2022 inductees: Daniel and Henrik Sedin.
The first time Luongo took a face-off, he went up against Henrik. Wearing the same No. 1 he wore as a goalie, he won the draw cleanly, pulling the puck back to a teammate.
(OK, Henrik didn’t even move his stick, but so what?)
“I think he was a center when he grew up,” Henrik said, smiling. “He’s big. He’s strong. Good timing. Impressive.”
The game between former NHL and women’s hockey stars featured two 20-minute halves and a 12-player shootout.
After failing to score on a couple of chances, Luongo fired the puck into the roof of the net in the second half, popping the water bottle. It looked like he showed tremendous patience to wait for an open net.
Not quite.
“I wanted to shoot, and then I didn’t see anything, and I just panicked,” Luongo said. “Then I held onto it, and all of a sudden, I had an empty net, so I tried to shoot it high.”
Luongo celebrated by doing the Griddy dance at the suggestion of his son, Gianni, 11.
“It wasn’t a beautiful one, but I did my best,” Luongo said.
Luongo’s second goal was beautiful, in all seriousness. In the shootout, he used what he called his only move, deking and flipping a backhand into the net.
“He started out slow, but he came on as the game went along,” Daniel said. “That shootout goal was pretty impressive.”
Goalie Cory Schneider laughed.
“I thought the breakaway goal was actually pretty good,” said Schneider, who played with Luongo with the Canucks and reunited with him on Team Lindros. “It was a nice finish.”
Schneider played in the American Hockey League on Saturday, making 30 saves for Bridgeport in a 2-1 overtime loss at Hershey. Still, he made the trip to play with Luongo and the Sedins one more time. Three other former Canucks played as well: center Brendan Morrison, and defensemen Kevin Bieksa and Dan Hamhuis.
“The best part was playing with the guys that I played with for a bunch of years,” Luongo said.
Maybe Luongo showed that goalies can do what forwards do.
“We were talking about it after the first half, and I asked him if this gave him a better appreciation for how hard it is out there,” Schneider said. “And then when he went off the water bottle and scored in the shootout, I think we both agreed that it’s a lot easier than they make it look. I think he’s got a future there. He made some nice moves.”
Then again, maybe not.
Had Luongo been a forward instead of a goalie, could he have challenged Daniel’s Canucks goals record (393)?
“Not a chance,” Daniel said, smiling.
Well, Luongo could have at least made it in the NHL as a forward, right?
“Not a chance,” Henrik said, smiling.
.