{"id":182856,"date":"2026-04-01T23:26:19","date_gmt":"2026-04-01T23:26:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/182856\/"},"modified":"2026-04-01T23:26:19","modified_gmt":"2026-04-01T23:26:19","slug":"igor-shesterkin-jacob-markstrom-drop-the-gloves-for-goalie-fight-at-msg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/182856\/","title":{"rendered":"Igor Shesterkin, Jacob Markstr\u00f6m drop the gloves for goalie fight at MSG"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>NEW YORK \u2014 Rangers goalie Igor Shesterkin and Devils goalie Jacob Markstr\u00f6m fought in the third period of New York\u2019s 4-1 win Tuesday at Madison Square Garden. Shesterkin looked to get the edge, feeding Markstr\u00f6m with a series of right-handed punches.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m trying not to swear, but that was awesome,\u201d captain J.T. Miller said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat a great fight,\u201d coach Mike Sullivan added. \u201cI didn\u2019t know Shesty had that in him.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The tension started when Devils forward Paul Cotter made contact with Shesterkin, driving to the net. Adam Fox and Vladislav Gavrikov immediately shoved Cotter against the glass. Shesterkin, known as a fiery presence, left his crease to give Cotter a shove. Markstr\u00f6m, evidently unhappy at Shesterkin pushing Cotter, skated down the ice and asked Shesterkin to fight.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI saw Shesty in the scrum, and normally, nothing happens,\u201d Miller said. \u201cBut I turned around and saw Marky in our crease. I was like, \u2018This is great.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">\ud83d\udea8 GOALIE FIGHT ALERT \ud83d\udea8<\/p>\n<p>IGOR SHESTERKIN AND JACOB MARKSTROM THROW DOWN \ud83e\udd4a <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/vEa9Ye0Yxr\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/vEa9Ye0Yxr<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Sportsnet\/status\/2039156278077825161?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">April 1, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The Rangers\u2019 goalie accepted Markstr\u00f6m\u2019s invitation, and the two fought for more than 20 seconds. Shesterkin\u2019s first thought was about how big the 6-foot-6 Markstr\u00f6m was, but the smaller goalie still managed to land the majority of the blows.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI just didn\u2019t want to get knocked out,\u201d Shesterkin said.<\/p>\n<p>Markstr\u00f6m had never fought at the NHL level, but he dropped the gloves with AHL Utica in 2015. The fight was the first of Shesterkin\u2019s career. He said with a smile that he thought his first fight would come against Islanders\u2019 goalie Ilya Sorokin, one of his friends.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ll wait for him,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>The Madison Square Garden crowd erupted as soon as the goalies engaged with each other. They began chanting Shesterkin\u2019s name after the fight, then roared again when the public address announcer read his name going over the penalty minutes.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe whole stadium was so loud,\u201d Shesterkin said.<\/p>\n<p>Cotter received a two-minute penalty for goaltender interference, and Shesterkin and Markstr\u00f6m were given two-minute penalties for leaving the crease and five minutes for fighting.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe did a good job, and the crowd seemed to enjoy it,\u201d said Markst\u00f6m, who added he saw the exchange with Cotter and wanted to give his team a spark.<\/p>\n<p>Shesterkin made 22 saves in net, and Sullivan raved about his work ethic and competitiveness in his postgame press conference.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cShesty means so much to this team,\u201d the coach said. \u201cIn a lot of ways he\u2019s the foundation. \u2026 I think in a lot of ways he personifies what we want to become.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Shesterkin\u2019s teammates were elated for him to have his moment, and they made sure to give him props in the aftermath. If it were a boxing match, he would\u2019ve been victorious.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFellas told me I probably won by points,\u201d Shesterkin said.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW YORK \u2014 Rangers goalie Igor Shesterkin and Devils goalie Jacob Markstr\u00f6m fought in the third period of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":182857,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[22380,9,24,55,54,541,539,56],"class_list":{"0":"post-182856","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-new-jersey-devils","9":"tag-new-york","10":"tag-new-york-city","11":"tag-new-york-city-headlines","12":"tag-new-york-city-news","13":"tag-new-york-rangers","14":"tag-nhl","15":"tag-ny"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=182856"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182856\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/182857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=182856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=182856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}