On November 16, 1997, the world’s most famous sports arena witnessed something that wasn’t supposed to happen—and hasn’t happened since.
The Colorado Avalanche were trailing the New York Rangers 4–1 late in the third period at Madison Square Garden.The game was effectively out of reach. The Sunday afternoon crowd was lulled into a quiet rhythm. Then, with just 3:30 left on the clock, Hall of Fame netminder Patrick Roy looked at the loose puck floating into his zone, looked at the 200 feet of sheet ahead of him, and decided to shatter the NHL rulebook for the sheer entertainment of it.
“What Is He Doing?!”
A loose puck rolled into the Colorado end. Usually, a goalie of Roy’s stature traps it, rings it off the glass, or leaves it cleanly behind the net for his defensemen. Not this time.
Roy gathered the puck on his stick blade, turned up-ice, and began gathering speed. As he neared the Colorado blue line, his defensive pair—Adam Foote and Sylvain Lefebvre—skated back to take their routine handoff. Roy didn’t just ignore them; he split his own defense like a rushing center, stepped over his blue line, and charged into the neutral zone with 30 pounds of goaltending equipment swaying in stride. Up on the MSG broadcast, legendary color commentator and former goalie John Davidson couldn’t contain himself, erupting in laughter as the absurd scene unfolded live.
Standing near the red line to meet the rushing goalie was Wayne Gretzky. Rather than dumping the puck in or panicking, Roy pulled off a move straight out of a video game. He pulled the puck back with a slick toe-drag, executed a flawless spin-o-rama around No. 99 at center ice, and crossed the red line into Rangers territory before dishing the puck off to forward Adam Deadmarsh.
Rule 27.7: The Whistle Blows
The Garden crowd exploded into absolute delirium. On the Avalanche bench, players and coaches were doubled over laughing. Then came the whistle. Referee Paul Devorski immediately blew the play dead. Under NHL Rule 27.7—a rule originally instituted in 1967 to protect goalies after Gary “Suitcase” Smith was leveled while rushing the puck—a goaltender is strictly prohibited from participating in the play in any manner beyond the center red line.
Devorski pointed to the penalty box and assessed Roy a two-minute minor for participating in play over center ice.Roy, ever the showman, simply turned back toward his net and offered Devorski a classic, exaggerated French-Canadian shrug as if to ask what all the fuss was about.
Legendary Quotes from a Legendary Night
The locker room post-game quotes cemented the moment in hockey lore forever:
“I made a spin-o-rama move on Wayne Gretzky! How many goalies can say they ever deked The Great One at center ice?”
— Patrick Roy
“I saw him cross our blue line and thought, ‘What is he doing?’ Then he did the spin-o-rama on Gretzky and I couldn’t stop laughing. He tried to tell me he lifted his stick over the red line so it didn’t count!”
— Marc Crawford, Avalanche Head Coach
“That’s Patrick. Patrick does things that he’s the only guy that could do. I just couldn’t believe it—he looked pretty good!”
— José Théodore, NHL Goaltender
Roy served his two minutes, the Rangers locked up their 4–1 win, but the scoreboard didn’t matter. Everyone in attendance—and millions watching at home—had just witnessed the ultimate display of Patrick Roy’s legendary confidence.
Keep on Keeping on!
Evan ‘REV’ Renaerts
You can follow me on X @revingev
For news going on around the NHL and in the hockey world and future Prospects in Jr hockey you can head over to REVS TOP 15 where I post yearly prospects that I see as players who will end with the best careers. (Special thanks to several Scouts and agents around several Hockey leagues across North America & Europe for sending me stats and stories for many places I am unable to be at games that I am unable to be at myself.) Head over to the X-platform and give me a follow @revingev to catch all the latest rumours moves and even upcoming Podcasts to watch live for our weekly TWO GUYS & HOCKEY TALK ‘Live show’ on Wednesdays 7pm MDT.
