Willie O'Ree, the Jackie Robinson of hockey, was being interviewed during a second-period TV timeout on the big board at PPG Paints Arena on Thursday night. The man who broke the NHL's color barrier 60 years ago was saying how Ryan Reaves had promised he'd get a goal for him.
Does that make Reaves the Babe Ruth of hockey?
Did the Penguins' tough guy really call his shot?
If so, that's a pretty bold prediction for a guy who had scored just 30 career goals in his eight-year NHL career, or one fewer than Evgeni Malkin has this season, no?
TAP ABOVE FOR BOXSCORE, STANDINGS, VIDEOWell, you'll have to forgive Mr. O'Ree if his memory isn't as sharp as it once was. He is 82 years old.
"I don't promise goals. I cannot promise goals," Reaves said with a laugh afterward. "You've seen my scoring touch. I said I'd have a good game for him and hopefully get him one."
Of course Reaves had a good game, and he did get one for O'Ree in the 3-1 win over the Kings. It was a poignant moment for Reaves -- one of roughly two dozen players in the NHL of African descent -- during a month that the league is celebrating as "Hockey is for Everyone." Reaves had met O'Ree for the first time after Thursday's morning skate and posed for this photo:
It was an honor to have you at morning skate, Willie O'Ree!
Coach Sullivan: “Willie is a testament to perseverance. He might have faced more adversity than any of us. I think he’s a great example of dedication. He’s been a great ambassador to the sport.”#HockeyIsForEveryone pic.twitter.com/v1b63RgPD8
— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) February 15, 2018
"Obviously with Willie O'Ree in the house, pretty special," Reaves said. "He's a pioneer for players like me, and it was nice getting him one."
And it wasn't just some random, fluky goal either. This wasn't like his last goal on Feb. 6 when he tried to put the puck off Marc-Andre Fleury's pads to get a rebound for Jake Guentzel. This was an honest-to-goodness goal-scorer's goal. Against Jonathan Quick, no less.
If you didn't know better, you'd swear it was Phil Kessel:
"Just a big screen in front," Reaves explained. "I saw Quick leaning to my right and just saw a lot of open net. The bench yelled 'Shoot!' I shot it."
Voila!
It was one of three shots for Reaves, tying a season high, and it was his fourth of the season and the first unassisted goal of his career. It was also his second in five games following his goal against the Golden Knights.
"It was nice, coming off the last game," Reaves said. "I don't know how much hockey you watch, but I was absolutely horrendous last game. I needed a bounceback."
Horrendous might be a bit much, but it's true that he didn't convert on two good looks against the Senators on Tuesday. He also didn't convert early in the first period on this partial breakaway:
"Mitts weren't silky enough, I guess," Reaves said. "Just caught the top of his pad. I thought I caught him, but no dice."
It was Reaves' seventh straight game in the lineup after being a healthy scratch the previous three. It could be argued that the only reason Reaves returned to the lineup was due to injury. When Bryan Rust returned from his upper body injury on Jan. 23, Reaves was scratched for the first time after playing in the first 49 games. When Patric Hornqvist went down with a lower body injury on Feb. 2, Reaves was reinserted.
Sullivan maintains that his lineup is based merely on who gives his team the best chance to win against a particular opponent. The more physical the opponent, the more likely it is that Reaves plays, serving as a policeman on the ice.
"It wasn't anything where we were tying to send a message to Reavo," Sullivan said.
But that's not how Reaves took it. He has used the slight as motivation and, judging by Thursday, it's working.
"I think anytime I get healthy-scratched it's a message and something you have to look at to work on your game," he said. "You have to come back with a response. I've been trying to do that the last couple games."
The 6-foot-1, 225-pound Reaves was Jim Rutherford's biggest, literally, off-season acquisition. The Penguins obtained Reaves -- along with a second-round pick, for Oskar Sundqvist and Pittsburgh's first-round pick in 2017 -- from St. Louis.
Sullivan maintains that Reaves has done exactly what the Penguins thought he would do. He has fought six times and has 84 penalty minutes. He's a punishing hitter and -- as we've seen lately -- he can chip in a little offensively.
"He does a lot of those little things and I think he endears himself to his teammates and his coaching staff because of it," Sullivan said.
But he's also the only player on the roster who doesn't play special teams. When Hornqvist returns, which could be as soon as this weekend against the Maple Leafs and Blue Jackets, it's quite possible that Reaves will find a seat in the press box again. That's to say nothing of the playoffs when fighting is rare and one power play against can be fatal.
On Thursday, Reaves took a bad holding penalty on Dion Phaneuf in the offensive zone. Though it was ticky-tack (see below), anytime you don't have two hands on your stick and touch an opponent, it's going to get called in today's game. Not exactly a good way to endear oneself to the coaching staff:
But Reaves totally redeemed himself with his goal in the second, along with his three hits. He ended up taking 10 shifts for 7:07, or 23 seconds more than his season average. That included taking a shift with seven minutes left in the third period and the Penguins holding a tenuous 2-1 lead.
No one knows for sure what the future holds though. Reaves is in the final year of a contract that will pay him $1.125 million for this season.
If the Penguins win the Cup a third straight year, you can bet that Reaves will be the first player to whom Sidney Crosby hands the mug. That's how much he's meant to his teammates.
But that stuff will have to wait for the summer. In the meantime, Reaves is living in the here and now. He sees the bigger picture, knew exactly what his goal on a Thursday night in February meant, especially with O'Ree in the house.
"If somebody can look at me playing in the NHL and realize that no matter where they come from or their ethnicity or their race, they can get in the league, too, and do what they want to do in life, then yeah, obviously, I embrace that."