Tuesday night, Andreas Athanasiou did it again. He made the highlight reels when he single handedly stole the puck, flipped one defenseman’s stick up in the air, undressed two defensemen, and twisted goalie Drew MacIntyre in knots before scoring yet another jaw dropping goal.
Don’t take my word for it though, see for yourself!
There’s so much to appreciate here.
First, Athanasiou sees that defenseman Dennis Robertson is having a little trouble getting the puck cleanly, so AA swoops in, and steals the puck right out from under his nose! AA then flips Robertson’s stick up into the air and it goes flipping away. Next, Athanasiou absolutely undresses defenseman Mike Cornell, walks right around him while flipping the puck through the D man’s feet and burning past him. But wait, there’s more! For a second it looks like the puck is going to skitter away from Athanasiou’s stick, but oh ho ho no. He reaches forward and brings the puck back to his stick, has it on his backhand, and by this time MacIntyre is long down and out and there’s no way he can do a darn thing to stop Greece’d Lightning! Not only did Athanasiou net a beautiful backhand goal, but the entire sequence that led to the goal is amazing. I feel like a broken record sometimes saying this repeatedly, but Athanasiou has the speed, hands, vision, and creativity to make a great NHL player. He’s so much more than Darren Helm with hands, so much more. People doubted he could do the fancy, jaw dropping highlight reel moves in the AHL that he did in juniors, yet here he is making AHL players look silly in his first year pro. I love it and I’ll never get enough. Soak it in guys, it’s beautiful.
