The 10 Worst NHL Goals Conceded in the 2014-15 Season

It’s the most wonderful time of the year for NHL fans.

Beards, blood and brawls abound as the quest for Lord Stanley's Cup takes center stage in every hockey fan’s heart. We're left with nothing but the best of the best, but, as with anything in life, "good" must coexist with "bad."

Well, the 2014-15 NHL regular season featured plenty of bad, especially for the guardians of the goal.

So, while the 15 remaining teams—Winnipeg was swiftly swept by Anaheim—continue their battle for sport's most beloved chalice, here's a look at the 10 worst goals of the NHL season to date.

Ranking Criteria

Importance: When did the goal take place? Did it matter in the grand scheme of things? Game-winning goals, especially those of the overtime variety, will be weighed more heavily. That goes double for playoff goals. A bad (or hilarious) goal surrendered by a team already out of playoff contention, or already down big, won't mean as much.

Hilarity: Did the goal look weird? Was it a bizarre set of circumstances? How often do you see something like this in a professional hockey? Extra points here for pucks deflected off derrieres.

Pain: How did everyone react? Are there pained expressions emanating from the goalie, the team or the fans? Are the announcers giggling, overcome with pure disdain or a little of both? Things like wincing, grimacing and swinging at the goal all play a factor here.

10. Reimer Tries to Luge

Things were different for Toronto back on November 15.

The Maple Leafs were 9-6-2; still respectable, still in contention, still far away from the misery that 2015 would bring.

But James Reimer's mistimed mishap against the Buffalo Sabres—who eventually finished dead last in the NHL with 54 points—may have been a harbinger of the doomed days to come. Reimer allowed six goals on 35 shots, but this was his coup de grace.

Already down 1-0 in the first period, Reimer flew out of the net to stop a Brian Flynn breakaway. The 27-year-old Canadian woefully misjudged his lunge, leaving Toronto scrambling.

Chaos ensued.

Flynn found Zemgus Girgensons flying down the ice and hit him right in front of the net. Reimer made a final, desperate slide back to the net, which ultimately left him looking more like a luging penguin than an actual goaltender.

“It’s a play where I sometimes come out and see if I can get the puck...I don’t know what happened there,” Reimer said following the game, according to Terry Koshan of the Toronto Sun. “I felt like maybe the puck slowed down a bit. But I could not get out there and could not get back in time."

Needless to say, things didn't exactly buck up for Reimer—who finished 41st out of 42 qualified goaltenders in goals-against average—and Toronto as the season wore on.

9. Roberto Luong-NO!

In the grand scheme of things, this goal didn't mean much. Florida was already up 5-1 in this Feb. 10 game and went on to win 6-2, but the goal itself—and Luongo's response on Twitter—deserved the No. 9 spot in these power(less) rankings.

It all starts as a seemingly innocuous play.

Tim Jackman takes the puck from center ice and, with a nonchalant flick, dumps it towards the net, with Luongo waiting to easily snatch it up.

Well, a little knuckle-puck action, a couple of Ducks charging fast and a blase approach by Luongo ended up making the four-time All-Star look pretty foolish.

At least he has a good sense of humor about the whole thing...

8. Braden Holtby with the Assist...to the Wrong Team

Oh, poor Braden Holtby.

This unfortunate occurrence happened back on November 15, when the season was still young. New Jersey and Washington both came into the game with seven wins, jostling for early position in the Metropolitan Division.

All game, Holtby and Corey Schneider flawlessly defended their castle, but one simple miscue left the Capitals' drawbridge down, and it was all Mike Cammalleri needed.

Tied at 0-0 with just over 10 minutes to go in the final period, Holtby went to play the puck around the back of the net. He slung it against the boards, a perfect pass.

To the wrong team.

Cammalleri immediately seized upon the mistake and flicked the puck in from a difficult angle before Holtby could reclaim his spot in front of the net.

Holtby's frustration poured over as he slashed at the crossbar with his stick. It was his only miscue of the game, as he stopped 27 of 28 shots on the night.

But sometimes, it just takes one.

“That point in the game you have to pick the safe play,” Holtby told The Associated Press following the tough defeat. “And I didn’t, and it cost us.”

7. Tokarski's Trippin'

A painful overtime loss at that hands of an atrocious Edmonton Oilers team caused by a teammate tripping his own goalie?

Thats a trifecta of terror for Habs fans.

With just over three minutes left in overtime, Nail Yakupov snared a rebound and charged up the ice, with several Canadiens in close pursuit.

Yakupov snapped a shot at Dustin Tokarski from the near right side, which missed wide and deflected off the back wall.

In the brief, chaotic confusion, defenseman Tom Gilbert slid into Tokarski and took him out, leaving a perfect opening for Anton Lander.

Tokarski made a feeble attempt from the ice, but he was basically prone, not exactly a prime goal-stopping position.

"There's no better feeling than to come back and win in overtime," Lander told the Associated Press (h/t USA Today) following the unexpected victory. "It's a great team win."

Naturally, Habs coach Michel Therrien was less than amused.

"We played a really bad game in all aspects. We were lucky to get one point."

Montreal is up 3-1 on Ottawa right now, so things aren't all bad.

6. Brandon Sutter's Backside Equalizer

When unexpected things happen, people like to say they pulled something out of their...well, you know.

It's not too often that something is an equalizing goal in an NHL game, but, for Brandon Sutter, that's exactly what it was.

With Pittsburgh down 1-0 to Arizona and playing largely uninspired hockey, the Puck Gods dropped some good fortune on the Penguins when Mike Smith's clearance pass found Sutter's twirling backside for one of the most bizarre goals you'll ever see.

"I turned because I didn't want to take it in the face and it hit me right in the rear end," Sutter told the AP after the game (h/t ESPN). "I've never had one of those before. That's patience around the net right there. That's my touch around the net."

The Penguins would tack on two more goals to seal the victory, 3-1.

This ended up being an extremely fortunate win for Pittsburgh, who just eked into the Stanley Cup Playoffs as the final Eastern Conference wild-card team.

They can thank Brandon Sutter's derriere for that.

5. Ondrej Pavelec's Singin' the Blues

This was Ondrej Pavelec's first game in goal in nearly a month, and as far as returns go, this one was going swimmingly.

Winnipeg pulled Michael Hutchinson after he gave up four goals on just seven shot attempts in this March 10 game. For the next 27 minutes, Pavelec was denying everything thrown at him.

It was that last 66 seconds that got him.

With just about 1:06 left in the third period, Barret Jackman dumped the puck in a few feet ahead of center ice. Surely, this was nothing to worry about.

Well, three seconds later the puck was in the net, and every single Blues player's head was hung low.

Pavelec didn't speak to reporters following the game, but NBA Sports' Mike Halford reported that the 27-year-old Czech goaltender was a a bit testy with the media the following day.

"

Listen, I didn’t play for three weeks, I was sitting on the bench for three weeks, and I just went in and it was 4-1, and I just tried to have fun and enjoy the game. I was happy I was in the game. But obviously, what happened, happened. I’m not the last guy it’ll happen [to], but like I said before, it happened at a bad time.

"

Winnipeg's season was erased by the Anaheim Ducks' 4-0 sweep in the first round of the playoffs. I'm betting Pavelec wishes this clip would be erased, too.

4. Tuukka Rask and the Magic Puck

This was just a brutal loss for the Boston Bruins, who ended up missing the playoffs by just two points.

There are plenty of moments Boston can look back and kick itself for, but this series of events against Calgary on Feb. 16 is one of the main culprits for the Bruins' postseason absence.

Up 3-0 early in the second period, Tuukka Rask and the Bruins completely gave the game away, surrendering four straight goals, the final one with just two seconds left in overtime.

Gliding swiftly toward the right side of the net, TJ Brodie flicked a shot up at Rask. The puck deflected off the stick of Brad Marchand, but Rask got a glove on it.

Somehow, the puck bounced off the top crossbar, danced around as if it had a mind of its own and jumped onto Rask's back, sending this little magic bullet caroming into the back of the net.

"I knew there wasn't too much time left. I was just trying to get the puck to the net. It took about three or four bounces and luckily it went in," Brodie told the AP (h/t Daily Herald), acknowledging his stroke of luck.

"We let the game go a long time before that," Marchand said. "That just kind of ended it on a sour note."

3. Andrei Markov: Ottawa Senators' Sleeper Agent?

What's worse than scoring an own goal in the playoffs? Scoring an own goal in the playoffs and losing the game.

Luckily for Montreal Canadiens defenseman Andrei Markov, he's only guilty of one of those most heinous hockey crimes.

In the first period of a 0-0 game, the Ottawa Senators' Milan Michalek dumped the puck down into Canadiens territory. Ottawa's Mika Zibanejad and Montreal's P.K. Subban chased down the boards after it, while Markov set up directly in front of Carey Price.

The puck just floated toward Markov, who inadvertently went five-hole on his own goaltender.

Had Montreal not come back in Game 1 to win 4-3, Markov might find himself steeped in the wrong kind of Canadiens lore. But winning cures all, as Price attested to following the game.

"It doesn't matter; it doesn't matter at all," Price told NHL.com's Sean Farrell. "It's over. We won the game."

Montreal currently leads the series with Ottawa, 3-1, and Markov and Price can sleep easy knowing they won't end up at No. 1 on this list.

2. Corey Crawford Sets Goaltending Back 50 Years

Speaking with the Chicago Sun-Times and Blackhawks beat reporter Mark Lazerus following the Feb. 20 game, Corey Crawford summed it up best: "No way I should ever play the puck like that. Close to the net, took a hop, just a stupid play on my part."

There's no way around it: This was a ridiculously bad play on the puck by Crawford.

Brad Stuart of the Colorado Avalanche has scored 80 goals over his 14-year NHL career, but none ever came as easy as his score on Crawford.

The Blackhawks are currently up 3-2 on Nashville in the first round of the playoffs, but things aren't going so well for Crawford.

Twice a Stanley Cup champion, Crawford was pulled in Game 1 by coach Joel Quenneville, and it doesn't look like he'll be getting a starting nod anytime soon.

"It'd be tough to make a change [back to Crawford]," Quenneville told WGN-Radio in Chicago on April 21.

Well, if Crawford ever needs a good laugh (or cry), he can always do a quick YouTube search of his most infamous moment on ice.

1. Oliver Ekman-Larsson's 114 Feet of Sliding Glory

We end the list right back where we started it: in Toronto's net.

Thankfully for James Reimer, he was on the sideline when this all went down. I'm sure he doesn't mind being left out of the video this time.

This 114-foot flick from Phoenix Coyotes defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson from his own blue line was never intended to do anything more than kill the remaining 20 seconds on Toronto's power play. Happily for fans of bad goals, it ended up being so much more.

"I saw we had about 23 seconds left on the penalty kill, and when I got the puck, I just shot it down the ice," Ekman-Larsson told NHL.com's Mike Brophy following the game.

Somewhere along its journey, the puck got some friction and began to pirouette. Somehow, the movement was just enough to evade the lax clutches of Jonathan Bernier.

Arizona went on to score two more goals, winning the game 3-1 and sending Toronto to its eighth straight defeat. That losing streak eventually hit 11, and this Bernier goal perfectly encapsulates everything that went wrong with the Maple Leafs during that horrific stretch.

"It was a bad goal and it was frustrating," Bernier admitted to the Toronto Sun's Mike Koreen. "I made 32 saves before that, we had a pretty good performance and they get on you.”

It's not often a pair of teammates gets to bookend a list of the worst goals of the season, but with the way things went in Toronto this year, this just seems fitting.

Bonus: Matt O'Connor's National Championship Gaffe

The Boston University Terriers led the Providence College Friars 3-2 in the NCAA collegiate national championship game on April 11.

Enter Matt O'Connor, the Terriers' junior goaltender.

This blunder tied the game at 3-3 and shocked basically every single person in the arena. Providence would go on to win 4-3 and capture its first national hockey title.

Matt O'Connor might never sleep again.