Remembering the Blue Jackets' top five goals of 2022
This Blue Jackets' season has been full of forgettable nights.
They started out 3-9-0, hampered by key injuries to Patrik Laine and Justin Danforth. They’ve gone through a rash of further injuries that eliminated nearly half the roster. They’re heading toward a bottom three finish in the NHL, as a contingent of rookies and second-year players cut their teeth to gain needed experience.
That doesn’t mean, however, that calendar year 2022 was all bad. There were memorable nights for happier reasons, too. Here’s a look back at the Blue Jackets’ top five goals of 2022:
Voracek stuns Boston Bruins
Date/location: Mar. 5, 2022 at Nationwide Arena
Type of shot: Slap shot
Situation: The Blue Jackets trailed the Boston Bruins 4-3 with less than 10 seconds to play and the Columbus net empty for an extra attacker.
Breakdown: One of the most dramatic conclusions to regulation in recent memory happened the same night the Blue Jackets hoisted Rick Nash’s No. 61 to the rafters at Nationwide Arena.
Time nearly ran out on the Jackets’ push, but Jakub Voracek came to the rescue with a long slapper through traffic that beat goalie Jeremy Swayman under the blocker on the far side with 1.8 seconds left. A forward known more for passing than shooting sent the sellout crowd into hysterics with a spine-tingling goal and Blue Jackets fans had ample reason to feel good despite Columbus losing in a shootout.
“It was a great pass,” Voracek said of a diagonal feed from Patrik Laine through traffic. “I mean, at that moment? To go through sticks, sauce pass with the bad ice? We talked about it after that. We were both worried it was going to hop over my stick and the game would be over there, but it landed perfectly and I was just trying to get it through. It was a good shot. Great feeling.”
Boone Jenner shocks Washington Capitals
Date/location: Feb. 8, 2022 at Capital One Arena in Washington, D.C.
Type of shot: Forehand-to-backhand deke
Situation: The game was tied 4-4 in the final minute of regulation.
Breakdown: Blue Jackets fans are used to dramatic finishes going the wrong way against Washington, but this was a stunning turn of events thanks to Patrik Laine, Gustav Nyquist and Boone Jenner ― whose goal with 45 seconds left in regulation was scored less than two minutes after Tom Wilson tied it for the Capitals.
Laine got the play started by avoiding a poke check along the right-wing wall in the neutral zone and getting the puck to Jenner for a controlled carry into the Capitals’ zone.
The Blue Jackets captain fired off a shot from the slot, forcing goalie Ilya Samsonov to make a save, and Nyquist got to the loose puck off the rebound. He quickly slid it back to Jenner in the low slot and the forehand-backhand move that followed was a thing of beauty. Jenner flipped the puck over Samsonov’s left pad into the net and the Blue Jackets skated off with a stunning victory.
“You just have to keep playing,” Jenner said. “There’s no point in sitting back ... no reason to hang your head after (Wilson's goal). It’s going to happen. I don’t think it bothered us at all. We just kept going out there and playing.”
Nick Blankenburg sinks Nashville Predators
Date/location: Oct. 20, 2022 at Nationwide Arena
Type of goal: Wrist shot
Situation: The Blue Jackets and Nashville Predators were tied 3-3 late in regulation after Columbus overcame a 3-1 deficit on goals by Johnny Gaudreau and Justin Danforth.
Breakdown: Danforth’s tying goal about six minutes earlier gave the Blue Jackets momentum to finish strong and that pressure produced a winning goal by Blankenburg with 1:23 left in regulation.
After Voracek prevented the puck from escaping the Nashville zone, he skated it to the left wing, stopped up, wheeled and fired a cross-ice pass to Blankenburg skating toward the net from his usual spot at the right point inside the blue line. The rookie defenseman fired a laser over goalie Kevin Lankinen’s right pad and inside the left goal post for what turned out to be the winner.
It was Blankenburg’s first goal of the season in his second game, after sitting out the first three as a healthy scratch.
Blankenburg: “I can’t look back on too many big moments and I was really scoring the big goals or anything like that, but maybe I was just saving it for now, hopefully, and I’ve got a couple more in me."
Jack Roslovic’s OT winner nets first hat trick with Blue Jackets
Date/location: April 9, 2022 at Little Caesar’s Arena in Detroit
Type of goal: Redirection of pass
Situation: The game was tied 4-4 with 1:41 left in overtime.
Breakdown: Jack Roslovic finished the season on a tear as the Jackets’ top center while Jenner was out with a back injury, and this game was a great example. Roslovic scored the first and final goals in the game along with another one early in the third to put the Blue Jackets up 3-2 against the Detroit Red Wings.
He finished with four points on three goals and one assist for his first hat trick as a Blue Jacket, netting the third goal 3:19 into overtime to win it. After sending Nyquist's a no-look, reverse feed to the left wing, Roslovic went to the net with his stick on the ice and was rewarded when Nyquist sent him a pass back for a quick redirection past goalie Alex Nedeljkovic.
Johnny Gaudreau goes around the world on Vancouver Canucks
Date/location: Oct. 18, 2022 at Nationwide Arena
Type of goal: Wraparound
Situation: The Blue Jackets trailed 3-2 near the midpoint in the third period.
Breakdown: Playing his fourth game with the Blue Jackets, Gaudreau helped his new team get its first win with an extraordinary individual effort. The speedy star forward scooped the puck inside his own blue line, wound up through the neutral zone, carried it into the Vancouver Canucks’ end and went wide around the left post – zipping around defenseman Riley Stillman.
Gaudreau deftly used his edges to move behind the net and goalie Spencer Martin knew a wraparound was coming. Martin tried to slide his left skate over to close off the right post, but he was a fraction of a second too late. Gaudreau tucked the puck off the goalie’s skate blade into the net for a goal that got Nationwide Arena rocking and provided the momentum for Vladislav Gavrikov eventual overtime winner.
"I don’t want to pump my own tires here, but I had a lot of speed and I think I kind of threw the goalie off with my fake shot going around the net," Gaudreau said. "He kind of slid out of the net there."
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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Top five goals of 2022 for the Columbus Blue jackets
