One player, two goals, five seconds (2024)

Jack McVey

The puck dropped at center ice and Jack McVey hesitated for just a fraction of a second. Then the East Ridge senior catapulted into the Mounds View end, a gold-and-black blur racing toward the Mustangs goal.

After linemate John Kremer slipped the puck past one Mounds View defender in neutral ice and beat another with a spin-o-rama pass near the crease, all a wide-open McVey had to do was whip the puck into the left side of the net.

The play in the Raptors’ 3-0 victory on Thursday night at the TCO Sports Garden in Vadnais Heights took all of five seconds. That's right, McVey, who had scored moments earlier to force the center-ice face-off, netted two goals in less time that it takes to send a text message or tie a pair of shoes.

One player. Two goals. Five seconds.

“I didn’t really even know it was a thing until I was walking out of the rink and some parent yelled to me from their car that it was a state record,” McVey said about the rarity of his achievement. “I was like, ‘Oh, yeah?’ ”

The Minnesota State High School League lists 6 seconds as the previous state record for the fastest two goals by a single boys’ hockey player. Mason Clark of Redwood Valley scored twice in 6 seconds a section playoff game against Worthington last year to tie the mark set by Ben Nelson of Little Falls in 2008.

To put the rarity of McVey’s feat in perspective, the NHL lists the fastest two goals scored by one player at 4 seconds. Nels Stewart of the Montreal Maroons in 1931 and Deron Quint of the Winnipeg Jets in 1995 share the record. According to the NCAA Division I men’s hockey record book, John Gray of New Hampshire scored consecutive goals in 3 seconds in a 1971 game against Colgate. A category for the fastest consecutive goals by a player is not included in the National Federation of State High School Associations record book.

East Ridge coach Dustin Vogelgesang still was celebrating McVey’s first goal and talking to an assistant coach when he looked up to see McVey score the second.

“I looked up and saw John Kremer doing the spin-o-rama, then Jack scoring the goal,” Vogelgesang said. “It was crazy.”

Alex Westad, the public address announcer and clock operator for Mounds View home games, initially thought the goals were scored 6 seconds apart. Chris Drews, the official scorekeeper keying information into an online statistics application, first thought the goals were scored 4 seconds apart. There are two video feeds from the game, and the PrepSpotlight.Tv highlights show the game clock as each goal was scored. The clock stopped at 15:14 for the first goal and 15:08 for the second goal, although a frame-by-frame review of the second goal clearly shows the puck was in the net at 15:09.

“If I had to testify in court, with the availability of video, I would call it five seconds,” said Drews, who initially keyed in 4 seconds between the goals in what he said was likely just a typing error.

“I was still entering the first goal when the second one was scored,” he said. “I hadn’t even looked up yet.”

As the coach of the home team, Mounds View’s Adam Schmidt has the final sign-off on the scoresheet. Based on input from off-ice officials Westad and Drews, the two goals now read as having been scored five seconds apart on the official scoresheet.

“I understand the gravity of getting it correct because of the record aspect,” Vogelgesang said. “But the bottom line, whether it was four, five or six seconds, is it was two quick goals.”

Vogelgesang said uncertainty this fall about whether there would be hockey season because of the COVID-19 pandemic — and the multiple delays before it finally started — were particularly hard on McVey, who has been on the varsity roster since he was a freshman.

“He just loves the game,” Vogelgesang said. “If there was one player who needed us to play this winter it was him. It’s only fitting that if someone from our team was going to get a little bit of the limelight, it would be him.”

McVey’s three goals this season lead the Raptors, who are 2-2-0 after Saturday’s 3-2 loss to White Bear Lake. Barring another record-setting outburst, the back-to-back goals that have thrust McVey in the spotlilght — a TV camera crew was shooting footage of McVey at practice on Friday — will undoubtedly be the highlight of a hockey career McVey said he expects will end after this season.

“I didn’t think it was that fast in the moment,” McVey said about his feat. “But looking at it after ... damn, it was pretty quick.”