NHL History Beckons as Iginla One Shy of 500th Goal at BetLM

NHL History Beckons as Iginla One Shy of 500th Goal

WASHINGTON — Jarome Iginla says he would rather dis­cuss his team’s ongo­ing bat­tle in the West­ern Con­fer­ence stand­ings, but the Flames cap­tain can’t help but flash his trade­mark smile when the topic of his upcom­ing mile­stone is brought to his atten­tion.

Calgary’s all-time lead­ing scorer enters play Tues­day one goal shy of becom­ing the 42nd player in NHL his­tory with 500 career tal­lies.

“I may not know how many guys have done it but it is spe­cial for me to be this close to 500, and I do kind of still have to pinch myself that it’s hap­pen­ing,” Iginla told NHL.com.

“When I started to play in the NHL — to think I’d be able to play 1,000 games and to be this close to 500 goals … it would have been crazy. But that’s why part of me wants to enjoy it … and when you hit dif­fer­ent things, dif­fer­ent mile­stones like 1,000 games, it makes you think back and look back and reflect a bit, and I def­i­nitely really appre­ci­ate it.”

With a rash of injuries hav­ing swept through the NHL this sea­son, Iginla is quick to ref­er­ence his his­tory of good health when asked to explain how he has been able to close in on 500 goals.

Iginla has played in all but 12 games since the 2004-05 work stop­page. He enters play Tues­day hav­ing played in 399 con­sec­u­tive games, and dat­ing back to the 1996–97 cam­paign, Iginla has never played fewer than 70 games in a sea­son.

Not bad for a guy who has never shied away from con­tact and is often the tar­get of oppos­ing play­ers.

“When I played with him, he could make some big hits and he’d drop the gloves,” said Cap­i­tals defense­man Roman Ham­r­lik, a 19-year NHL vet­eran who played in Cal­gary from 2005-07. “He was just really tough to play against. If you (tick) him off, he’s not afraid of any­body and he’ll fight back. Over­all he’s one of the best play­ers in our League — one of the best I ever played with.”

Added team­mate and long­time Van­cou­ver Canuck Bren­dan Mor­ri­son: “He has a tremen­dous amount of respect from not only guys on this team, but from guys all around the League. When you think of the Flames, you think of Iginla. He’s a great leader and true pro­fes­sional — knows when to speak and what to say, and he’s easy to fol­low on the ice.”

While Iginla has again man­aged to stay healthy this sea­son, many of his team­mates can­not say the same. The Flames began the week with 155 man games lost — tops in the West­ern Con­fer­ence — and it may be partly to blame for Calgary’s 12th place stand­ing.

The Flames enter play Tues­day hav­ing lost three straight, but their season-long seven-game road trip has also seen Olli Joki­nen suit up for his 1,000th career game, and Mor­ri­son record his 200th career goal. Iginla’s mile­stone should be next.

“It’s a tremen­dous accom­plish­ment, a tremen­dous mile­stone,” Flames coach Brent Sut­ter said. “Scor­ing 500 goals in the National Hockey League is quite a feat. He’s been a great player for the Flames, but he’s at the stage of his career now where he wants to have some team suc­cess and win and that’s what we’re about.

“I think he’d like to get [goal No. 500] over with just like every­one else so we can get it done and move on.”

In addi­tion to his health, Iginla also points to a num­ber of for­mer team­mates for their con­tri­bu­tions as he approaches the per­sonal mile­stone.

“The first guy that comes to mind is Craig Con­roy — a very good pass­ing cen­ter­man,” he said. “I’m prob­a­bly more of a shooter, and you’re for­tu­nate as a winger when you get to play with cen­ters who really look for you. I know that he got in trou­ble on a lot of nights for try­ing to look for me maybe a lit­tle too much, but it was fun to play with and you appre­ci­ate that as a winger.

“Marc Savard, when we were younger, I played with him, Alex Tan­guay. … I’ve just been for­tu­nate. … It is neat when you look back and I’ve def­i­nitely been very for­tu­nate to play with some very good play­ers and have good chem­istry, but I’d prob­a­bly put ‘Con­nie’ right up there.”

Iginla’s pri­or­ity remains win­ning hockey games and climb­ing up the stand­ings, but the 34-year-old admits the pres­sure can mount if he goes a few games stuck on 499.

“That will hap­pen,” he said of the 500th goal enter­ing his mind. “Some­times when you’re going down get­ting ready to shoot I imag­ine it will prob­a­bly be in my head. I remem­ber try­ing to go for 50 and you’re think­ing, ‘Geez, maybe it could be this shot,’ but you try to get that out of your head because it plays with you a bit.”

Iginla is a two-time 50 goal scorer and a two-time win­ner of the Rocket Richard Tro­phy as the NHL’s lead­ing goal scorer. His 15 goals this sea­son are tied for the team lead with line­mate Cur­tis Glen­cross.

The Flames con­clude their road trip this week with games in Wash­ing­ton and Boston before return­ing home to face Min­nesota on Sat­ur­day.

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