This Nasty No-Look Pass From Connor Bedard Is The Exact Reason Why Secondary Assists Matter In The NHL
I never understood why other sports don't keep track of secondary assists. Don't get me wrong, Teuvo Teravainen makes a great one-touch pass right to the tape for Nick Foligno to bang home that tic-tac-toe. But the only reason that puck ended up in the back of the net is because Connor Bedard is one sick little puppy and got the party started.
Right here everyone is probably just assuming Bedard is going to let one fly and maybe shoot for a rebound or something. Nobody is even focused on Teravainen. So the moment the puck gets snapped over to him, the entire defense has to quickly scramble and figure out what the fuck is going on. They have about 0.75 seconds to figure it out before Teravainen ends up snapping it right back to Foligno on the doorstep. But everybody's heads are turned, everybody is going the wrong way, all because Connor Bedard turned the blender on.
If this were basketball, nobody would know Connor Bedard had anything to do with that play if they were just reading the box score. I'm the biggest lacrosse guy on the internet, but nobody would know that Connor Bedard had anything to do with this play if it was lacrosse.
Obviously I'm aware there are plenty of moments where players are basically gifted a free point with a secondary assist that really didn't have too much to do with the goal being scored. So it's not like secondary assists ALWAYS matter. But nasty no-looks like this to start the engine? That's exactly why you can't go around poo-pooing guys who are secondary assist merchants. Because sometimes they have more to do with the goal than the primary assist does.