The average shift in the National Hockey League is well under one minute before a player hops back over the boards, but tell that to New York Islanders star defenseman Matthew Schaefer.
The Islanders paid a visit to the Nashville Predators on Tuesday night, in what turned into a wild game.
New York built up a 3-0 lead, but the Predators rallied with three unanswered goals to force overtime.
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That is where we saw Schaefer do something that has never been seen since the NHL started tracking this kind of data in 2009-10.
Schaefer, the reigning Calder Trophy winner, is a dynamic two-way defenseman, which means he was practically purpose-built for 3-on-3 overtime. So, unsurprisingly, head coach Peter DeBoer sent the 19-year-old out to get the extra frame started.
Schaefer stayed on the ice for the first half of the extra period before Nashville’s Filip Forsberg tripped him, forcing the period’s first stoppage.
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The top pick in the 2025 NHL Draft quarterbacks the Isles’ top power play unit, which is more than likely why DeBoer used a timeout to give his boys a rest.
When play resumed, Schaefer stayed on the ice for the rest of overtime.
That made him the first player in at least fifteen years to stay on the ice for the entirety of a 3-on-3 overtime.
That sounds brutal. Sure, the timeout and the fact that the second half of OT was almost exclusively in the Nashville zone due to the power play helped make it happen, but that is some insane endurance.
While the Isles needed a shootout to win the game 4-3, Schaefer logged a whopping 32:16, which, per Sportsnet, is the third-highest single-game total for any player this season.
Schaefer also had an assist in the game, giving him 11 points (2G, 9A) on the year, putting him at just under a point-per-game pace.
