Goaltender Curtis McElhinney retires with pure class.

The end of a long career.

HockeyFeed
HockeyFeed
Published 2 years ago
Goaltender Curtis McElhinney retires with pure class.
Kostas Lymperopoulos/CSM/Zuma

There will be no grand proclamations, there will be no major announcements, instead veteran netminder Curtis McElhinney has decided to retire in just about the classiest way you could imagine.

At some point either late on Friday night or during the early hours of Saturday morning, the long time National Hockey League backup goaltender simply changed his instagram profile. That profile now reads "retired pro athlete" leaving no doubt about the fact that McElhinney has played his final game in the NHL. There wasn't even so much as an Instagram post to follow it up, no thanking of his former teammates, family, friends or even his agents, just a very quiet and humble farewell from a guy who played the game the same way.

Despite never establishing himself as a big name in the National Hockey League, the veteran goaltender became quite a well known figure across the league due to his staying power as a backup goalie. With 248 career regular season games under his belt McElhinney spent time as a member of the Calgary Flames (three seasons), the Anaheim Ducks (two seasons), the Ottawa Senators (one season), the Phoenix Coyotes (one season), the Columbus Blue Jackets (four seasons), the Toronto Maple Leafs (two seasons, the Carolina Hurricanes (one season) and finally the Tampa Bay Lightning (two seasons).

In spite of never truly making a big splash McElhinney's perseverance and dedication to his role as a backup goaltender paid off for him in a big way in the end, earning him back to back Stanley Cups as a member of the Tampa Bay Lightning. Capturing hockey's equivalent of the holy grail is a feat that many goaltenders can only dream of, and to do it twice in the late stages of his career no doubt felt like a fitting reward for well over a decade of hard work.

McElhinney's career ends with a career 2.83 goals against average and a .907 save percentage, pretty solid numbers for a guy that never played more than 32 games in a single season.

We wish him all the best on his future endeavors, and we salute him for leaving the game in such a humble manner.

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