The NHL has had its share of emergency goaltender stories when a professional keeper is suddenly unable to participate in a game or a practice. The college kid who fills in between the pipes at the morning skate. A college coach who plays backup for the Phoenix Coyotes. The website editor who suddenly becomes a backup goalie for the Washington Capitals.
Add another unexpected goalie to the strange list: The New York bond trader who played goal in an NHL team practice at Madison Square Garden, because he's the younger brother of a player on that team.
Florida Panthers goalie Scott Clemmensen couldn't practice on Tuesday morning due to an injury. AHL goalie Tyler Plante was still en route to backup starter Tomas Vokoun against the New York Rangers that night.
The team needed a goalie for practice, so Panthers forward Marty Reasoner offered up a suggestion: He knew a goalie that was already in New York, played two seasons at Boston College and could be available for practice that morning … and who happened to also be his younger brother.
Adam Reasoner, 26, was working on Wall Street when Marty Reasoner contacted him around 10:30 a.m., expecting it was an offer he wouldn't refuse. "Pretty impressive turnaround. He was here in a half hour," Marty Reasoner told the Miami Herald.
"I got the text and I got the missed phone call, so I knew something was up. My boss was like, 'It's slow on the trading floor. Opportunity of a lifetime. Get out there.' … Had my [goalie gear] in the weight room, grabbed it and was here in a flash," Adam Reasoner told the Herald, adding that he told the cab driver to step on it.
"I knew a couple of shortcuts he wasn't taking. He was getting smacked in the head a little bit."
Adam Reasoner stepped onto the ice at MSG at 11:18 a.m., nearly 20 minutes after practice had begun. Coach Peter DeBoer said there would be no fine for Adam, but maybe his older brother would have to shell out the money to cover for him.
The morning skate lasted another 30 minutes, plenty of time for Adam, 26, to get himself a workout and face some shots from Marty, 34. Adam works as a trader for a bond shop, but he was a goaltender with the Bay State Breakers of the Eastern Junior Hockey League for three seasons and played one game at Boston College as a freshman in 2005-06
From George Richards at the Herald:
[Adam Reasoner] says he stays in shape playing with other financial folk in a Wednesday night game at Chelsea Pier. That's a little different than taking on the likes of Marty Reasoner, David Booth and Evgeny Dadonov during shootout drills at the end of practice.
"We have beer in the locker room after our games,'' Adam laughed, moments before asking rookie Keaton Ellerby if he could grab a Gatorade out of the giant bucket sitting in the middle of the dressing room.
"Grab all you want,'' Ellerby said. "You did great out there today.''
Here's Adam Reasoner, living the dream:
Sure, it was just a practice. But as Adam Reasoner said: It's also a heck of a story for the trading floor.