Early Candidate For Hockey Hit Of The Year: Crazy Hipcheck Sends Player Flipping And Flying

Last night the Colorado Avalanche fell to the Washington Caps 0-to-3, with NHL star Alexander Ovechkin getting his first goal of the year after sniping one in just over the goalie’s pads on the left net. The crowd went nuts, as they always do when Ovechkin scores, but that wasn’t the highlight of the night. Methinks the biggest moment of the game came in the first period, on a Washington power play, when Avalanche forward Matt Duchene got hipchecked, flipped upside down, and sent flying.

For his part, Duchene handled it like a champ and popped right up. Showing no signs that he’d just been demoralized with one of the best NHL hits we’ll see this year.

No gloves came off, no fights went down. This was a clean hit that was thrown at the very best of times, one the fans went NUTS for. We don’t get to see the hipcheck nearly often enough, and it’s clearly a crowd pleaser, so I think we need to get a grassroots campaign going with fans holding signs in the stands nationwide encouraging the greatest of highlights. The players have to listen, right? They’re all capable of the hipcheck but it’s never at the forefront of their consciousness because it’s so rare. We just need to give them a quick reminder that the hipcheck’s out there and they can utilize that glorious hit whenever the moment feels right.

(h/t Pete Blackburn @ Fox Sports)

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Cass Anderson is the Editor-in-Chief of BroBible. Based out of Florida, he covers an array of topics including NFL, Pop Culture, Fishing News, and the Outdoors.