About eight years later, my son David was a young reporter in Peoria, Ill. Snepsts was coaching the Peoria Rivermen. As David tells it, he introduced himself and said, “Mr. Snepsts, I am from Long Island — and in 1982 I was the happiest kid ...” And Snepsts said, “You’re talking about the Bossy goal!”

I caught up with Snepsts at an All-Star Game in Vancouver in 1998. He still wanted that pass back.

APRIL 20, 1983 The Islanders crushed the Rangers, 7-2, in Game 5 of the Patrick Division finals, and Bob Bourne made the most beautiful, athletic goal I will ever see. He picked up the puck behind his own net, with Billy Smith watching, and flitted his way right, then left, split two defenders and scored at an angle.

True, the Rangers were already behind, 4-1, and going down. But as I wrote back then, this was straight off the pond. Bourne was a great athlete and played minor league baseball, splitting first base with Clark Gillies in the Houston Astros’ chain. To watch him was to watch an athlete at the peak of his career — impromptu beauty.