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If you played sports growing up, you undoubtedly dreamed of becoming a professional athlete when you were older. Unfortunately, the vast majority of people will have to accept it’s not going to happen, and while a Chicago resident named Scott Foster probably thought he was in that boat, he unexpectedly earned the right to say he’s a member of the elite crew of hockey players who’ve made it to the NHL.
If you’re a particularly talented athlete, you might be able to leverage your skills to secure a scholarship in college, and while that’s a pretty impressive achievement on its own, most student-athletes will be forced to accept the fact their career is essentially and hope they can put their degree to good use after graduating.
That’s the position Scott Foster found himself in when his time at Western Michigan University came to an end. The Ontario native held his own as a goaltender on the junior hockey circuit in Canada before heading down to Kalamazoo, and he spent three seasons in net for the Broncos before graduating in 2006.
Foster eventually settled down in Chicago and pursued a career as an accountant while lending his netminding services to the beer league teams he played on in his free time. While he didn’t necessarily feel a ton of pressure in those games, the same can’t be said for the one he ended up playing in on March 29, 2018—the day he made his NHL debut with the Blackhawks.
How Scott Foster ended up playing goalie for the Chicago Blackhawks
Prior to the start of the 2016-17 season, the NHL adopted a new rule that required every team in the league to have an “emergency backup goaltender” (EBUG) in the arena on standby to step up in the event either team is unable to send a goalie out onto the ice.
It’s a pretty rare scenario, but it’s one that unfolded when a 42-year-old Zamboni driver helped the Hurricanes beat the Maple Leafs during a game in 2020—a legendary moment that led to plenty of fans revisiting the story of the accountant who’d pulled a similar move a couple of years before.
Foster was part of a men’s league at Johnny’s Icehouse in Chicago when the Blackhawks reached out to the rink in search of some guys who’d be willing to play the role of EBUG. His wife eventually convinced him to throw his name into contention, and it was a pretty sweet gig when you consider his job usually entailed watching an NHL game for free from the stands on the off-chance his services were needed.
However, he found himself in a slightly different situation when he headed to the United Center for a game between the Blackhawks and the Winnipeg Jets. Foster was on his way to the arena when he got a phone call informing him Anton Forsberg (who was slated to start the game for the home team) had been scratched from the lineup after tweaking something during the pregame warmup.
He was told to report to the locker room to suit up in the event something happened to backup goalie Collin Delia (who was making his NHL debut) and received a brand-new jersey with his name on it before spending the first couple of periods chilling in the locker room.
The Blackhawks pulled out to a 6-2 lead just a couple of minutes into the final frame, and it seemed like the highlight of Foster’s night was getting the chance to rub shoulders with some of Chicago’s stars behind the scenes. However, things took an unexpected turn when Delia was injured on a seemingly straightforward save before Foster emerged to take his place with 14:01 left on the clock.
Foster recorded his first save of the game a minute after he entered the contest, and he’d go on to block every single one of the seven shots he ended up facing by the time the final whistle blew to close out his first (and only) NHL game with a clean sheet.
Foster was named the game’s First Star, and reporters were quick to flock around one of the 18 NHL goalies in history who can technically say they have a perfect career save percentage of 1.000 as he reflected on his unexpected moment in the spotlight.
Foster had signed an amateur tryout contract with the Blackhawks prior to the game, and under the terms of the collective bargaining agreement, Chicago wasn’t allowed to pay him a single penny (although he did get to take home the No. 90 jersey he rocked on the ice).
Sure, a paycheck would’ve been nice, but you can’t put a price on that kind of memory.