Kenta Nilsson had already counted on a given goal.
Then Pelle Lindberg showed why he is one of the greatest.
With an incredible rescue, he robbed the countryman of a given dream goal.
It was not immediately easy for Pelle Lindbergh when he took the step over to North America, the NHL and the Philadelphia Flyers. It had not been crowded with European goalkeepers in the world’s best hockey league, and it took some years before the Swede got the chance to show how skilled he really was.
Incredible career
But once he got the chance, there was no longer any talk of who was the given first-choice goalkeeper in the Flyers. And it did not take long before Lindbergh had emerged as the best goalkeeper in the whole world. During the 1984/85 season, he was the great goalkeeping giant in the hockey world.
He had a save percentage close to 90, and was awarded the Vezina Trophy, as the NHL’s best goalkeeper. Today, 90 percent is not very high in this context, but at that time it was a bit sensational. And Lindbergh could really make a decisive save at any time, even when everyone had already scored a goal for the opponents. Just ask Kenta Nilsson…
Robbed the countryman
Mr Magic, as he was called, was a magician in the Calgary Flames, and scored points in the NHL. In a match against the Flyers, Nilsson came free, and he made a quick pull that had made any goalkeeper spin. But not Pelle Lindbergh. Instead, he turned around in a flash, threw himself forward, and managed to stop the puck from a given goal. There is hardly a better summary of what an incredible goalkeeper he was.
Just a few months after the classic rescue, one early Sunday morning in November, Lindberg crashed his Porsche in New Jersey. His life could not be saved, and he was only 26 years old.
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