Watch Denver Pioneers’ Juho Olkinuora make phenomenal stick save

University of Denver fans should gets shirts made reading, "Now Jussi a wide-open net, now you don't" after the ridiculous recovery save that their goalie Juho (Jussi) Olkinuora made in a big win over North Dakota on Friday night.

The Finnish netminder is already a campus hero, having gone from being a walk-on who had to take out $45,000 US student loan to attend DU to the starting goalie for the Denver Pioneers. He just added to his legend with this save on North Dakota star Corban Knight. Knight had about 24 square feet of net to look while Olkinuora was recovering from stopping the first North Dakota shot, but the goalie made a midair stick save.

That might compare rather favourably with St. Louis Blues goalie Jake Allen's absurd stick save last week in the NHL. For Olkinuora, his stop helped preserve Denver's 5-4 win over the No. 4-ranked team in the NCAA and it was part of a 35-save effort. The graduate of the USHL's Sioux Falls Stampede already seemed to be one of those great perseverance stories, going from insurance policy to taking the No. 1 job in Denver away from Sam Brittain, a Florida Panthers draft pick.

Only having so many hours in a day means this blog doesn't range into college hockey as often as it should, but when a graduate of a junior league makes a save like that, attention must be paid.

(Stick tap: Eye On Hockey.)

Neate Sager is a writer for Yahoo! Canada Sports. Follow him on Twitter @neatebuzzthenet. Please address any questions, comments or concerns to btnblog@yahoo.ca.