Most sports fans, especially those north of the border, have heard of the Gordie Howe hat trick.
The name describes a game in which a player records a goal, assist, and a fight. It takes its name from Mr. Hockey himself, a legendary goal-scorer in the NHL who also amassed over 1,000 career penalty minutes in his career.
Ironically, Howe only ever actually recorded two such hat tricks in his career, choosing apparently either to fight or score on most nights. Both of his Gordie tricks came during the 1953 season, and both occurred against the Maple Leafs.
Vancouver Canucks coach Rick Tocchet actually owns the NHL record for most Gordie tricks with 18, followed by Mimico native Brendan Shanahan who had 17.
At this point, you are likely wondering what this has to do with Lacrosse Culture Daily. Recently, nllstats.com operator Graeme Perrow added a feature to the site that allows interested folks to search for games with specific criteria. In this case, that allowed (sort of) to search for Gordie Howe hat tricks in the NLL.
It took a bit of cleaning, as we first had to search for games in which players recorded a goal, assist, and 5 or more penalty minutes. This gave back hundreds of results, which we then cleaned by scouring game sheets and recording whether the five minutes were awarded for fights or other penalties.
Unfortunately, individual game data only goes back so far as 2005, so our dataset will not include anything before that. But it likely doesn’t matter, as in the end, the undisputed king of Gordie Howe hat tricks is pretty obvious.
The Undisputed Champ
Shawn Evans recorded had a record 11 Gordie tricks in his career, good for almost double the next closest player. He accomplished his 11 Gordie tricks in 270 career games played. Tocchet needed 1,144 games for his 18.
The next closest player was Sean Pollack, who had six of his own. Pollack fought a lot for a player who didn’t spend that much time in the box. His 6 tricks came on just 250 career PIM’s. Evans had 667.
Rounding out the top five is Shawn’s brother Scott, and NLL legends Brodie Merrill and Dan Dawson. All three of those players accomplished the trick 4 times apiece.
In total, 107 players have accomplished the trick, with 33 of them doing it more than once. Below is a screenshot of the 33 repeat offenders.
Every Gordie trick in since 2005 can be found below! Or it can be found here.
10 Points and a Scrap
The most points ever recorded as part of the Gordie trick was 10, accomplished by Kevin Crowley and Randy Staats. Crowley had 6 goals and 4 assists, and fought Sid Smith at the buzzer on January 10th, 2015 in what has to be one of the craziest statistical nights of all time. He was awarded first star. Go figure.
That was one of only four times that a player has had 6 goals and 5 or more penalty minutes. John Grant Jr. did it twice, while Adam Jones did it once.
Staats did his in 2023, fighting Albany’s Brent Mitchell to go along with 2 goals and 8 assists.
How Many PIM’s?
The most PIM’s ever recorded in a Gordie trick was 34, accomplished by teammates Ryan Benesch and Cam Woods for the Toronto Rock on January 11, 2008.
The fights were actually documented on Youtube. They were just the sixth video ever posted to the NLL’s channel with 81k views.
Perhaps it was a typo in the game sheet, but at 14:08 of the second period, Benesch received a five-minute major for Roughing, a ten-minute misconduct for Roughing, and five-minute major for Fighting, a two-minute minor for Checking From Behind, and another ten-minute misconduct for “Second Major In.” He added a two-minute Unsportsmanlike conduct at the end of the game to bring his total to a round 34. He also had 3 goals, an assist, and 8 loose balls.
Benesch has only 167 PIM”s in his career, so the 34 he earned that night account for just over 20% of his career total.
Woods actually fought twice in the game, squaring off with the aforementioned Pollack in the first period. Then had another one with Travis Hill in the fourth quarter, and was assessed a five-minute Fighting, two-minute Roughing, and two ten-minute misconducts for fighting.
Ryan Cousins would score the OT winner that night for Minnesota, who won 17-16 in one of the crazier games in league history.
Help Me Help You
The most Gordie tricks in one game was three, on February 10th, 2012. That night, Rhys Duch, Lewis Ratcliff, and Mike Grimes combined for 6 goals, 10 assists, and 19 minutes in penalties for the Washington Stealth. Their teammate Paul Rabil also fought that night, but was held scoreless.
A few different times, both players in the fight accomplished the Gordie trick.
The first was on January 21, 2006 when Edmonton’s Brad Dairon and Calgary’s Kevin Dostie fought each other. The pair combined for 3 goals and 2 assists that night.
On February 17, 2007 Shawn Evans (1 goal, 3 assists) and Portland’s Ian Crashley (1 goal, 1 assist) went toe-to-toe. Two years later, Pollack (2 goals, 1 assist) and Rob Van Beek (1 goal, 2 assists) had it out.
They would eventually become teammates for the Desert Dogs, but Zack Greer and Rob Hellyer scrapped on March 25, 2016, while Cody Jamieson and Brendan Bomberry did the same on March 2nd, 2019.
Other Records
Athan Ianucci accomplished his Gordie trick in the oddest of ways, fighting goaltender Anthony Cosmo from San Jose in their contest on March 14, 2008. Video of that one still survives as well!
The most recent Gordie trick was accomplished by Brandon Robinson, who had 2 goals, an assist, and fought Jonathan Gagliardi last season. Charlie Bertrand and Haiden Dickson also did it last year.
Did the results surprise you? Let us know in the comments below.