This Sidney Crosby goal is so difficult, you couldn’t even score it in a video game

Of the 463 goals Sidney Crosby has scored in the regular season and playoffs since he arrived in the NHL in 2005, this one is unquestionably in the top five:

Let’s have another angle:

In the second period of the Penguins’ game against the Canadiens on Wednesday in Pittsburgh, Crosby did something I’m pretty sure I haven’t seen before. He batted the puck out of the air twice, both times completely deliberately, in about one second to score a goal.

Crosby looks extremely casual while he’s doing it, and because he doesn’t dive after the puck or anything, the play doesn’t appear all that dramatic. But in terms of raw degree of difficulty, this is one of the hardest things in the sport, made to look so easy by its greatest player.

Crosby deked Carey Price — one of the world’s great goalies — without ever letting the puck touch the ground. Doing that at full speed with a defenseman coming to hit him from the back is one of the most bluntly impressive things he’s ever done on the ice. I’m pretty sure they haven’t even coded moves like that into NHL 18.

Hand-eye coordination is a Crosby strong suit and always has been. One of the most famous games of his career was Game 2 of a playoff series against the Capitals in 2009, when both Crosby and Alex Ovechkin scored hat tricks. Crosby’s third goal that game might’ve been his best goal out of mid-air until this one.

The Penguins handled it just as you’d expect:

My personal favorite Crosby goal ever is still this one, because it defies the laws of physics and how strong a human being’s wrist can be:

But this newest one is going directly into his greatest hits album.