Tuukka Rask will take his spot between the pipes for the Boston Bruins for the 500th time Tuesday night against the Toronto Maple Leafs.
It’s quite the milestone for the Boston goalie, who’s started the 2019-20 season with a 3-0-1 record, 1.72 goals-against average and .946 save percentage. It’s fitting his 500th games comes against the very team that traded him to the Bruins on June 24, 2006.
As for Rask, he’s just happy to have made it this far.
“They say it’s like 1,000 games for the (position) players, so it’s a big milestone,” he said, per NBC Sports Boston’s Joe Haggerty. “You play 500 games as a goalie it’s going to take some years, so it just goes to show you how old I am, I guess. That’s about it. It goes by so quickly. You don’t pay attention to how many total games you’ve played until you’ve reached a milestone and then you start looking back and say, ‘Holy crap — it’s 500 games and 11 years or whatever.’ Time flies. I’m just grateful I’ve been part of this team for so long and that I’m still in it.”
Rask has accomplished a lot in his time with Boston, including winning the Vezina Trophy after the 2013-14 season. And while he likely hasn’t checked everything off his to-do list, he can add playing in 500 games to the archives after Tuesday night.
