Jeff Skinner Scores Number Fifty

For the fifteenth time in team history, the Kitchener Rangers have a 50-goal scorer.

Jeff Skinner became the fourteenth different player to accomplish the feat, notching Number 50 last night versus the Owen Sound Attack.

Jeff Larmer hit the half century mark in back-to-back seasons, scoring 50 goals in 1980-81 and 1981-82.

Skinner is the first Ranger to mark the milestone in 23 years, following in the skate strides of Ron Goodall, who scored 52 in 1986-87.

Reaching the milestone puts Skinner’s name on the Don Cameron Trophy, awarded to a Ranger who scores 50 goals in a season.

The trophy’s namesake says he’s not at all surprised Skinner scored so many this season.

Don Cameron describes Skinner as a very special player who, like Goodall, has the speed and the shot to make anything possible on the ice.

But Cameron tells 570 News the comparisons end there as Skinner is a little more likely to get into the dirty areas around the crease to score a goal while Goodall was content to fire from the top of the face-off circle.

Cameron also says Skinner has accomplished the feat in a much different era of the game, an era where teams will design defensive schemes around a particular player, employ the trap and possibly even have better goaltending.

When Goodall scored 52 back in the mid-1980s, Cameron says teams were content to win games 8-7 or 7-6.

That’s one reason he believes it’s taken 23 years for another Ranger to reach the 50-goal plateau, adding that it seems a little more special to reach the mark in “this day and age of hockey” when even reaching 40 goals is an achievement.

Cameron also concedes that scoring 50 would be impossible without a little help from your friends.

He points to a remarkable overage season for Chris MacKinnon whom Cameron says is just as happy setting up a goal as he is scoring one himself.

Along with line-mate Jason Akeson, Cameron says the forwards have been formidable, especially when cycling the puck.

He also points to the need to stay healthy and have a handful of other things go right in a season — including being able to work through all that tight checking — in order to reach what Cameron believes is an “extremely special” goal scoring milestone.