Mick Vukota

Mick Vukota
Born (1966-09-14) September 14, 1966
Saskatoon, SK, CAN
Height 6 ft 2 in (188 cm)
Weight 215 lb (98 kg; 15 st 5 lb)
Position Right wing
Shot Right
Played for New York Islanders
Tampa Bay Lightning
Montreal Canadiens
NHL Draft Undrafted
Playing career 1987–2000

Marinko "Mick" Vukota (born September 14, 1966) is a former NHL right wing. Undrafted, he signed with the New York Islanders, who were looking to add toughness and muscle to their roster, on March 2, 1987. Vukota worked his way up through their system and found himself skating on NHL ice by the end of the 1987–88 season, also scoring his first goal. Also, perhaps more significantly, he registered 82 penalty minutes in 17 games on the way to becoming his team's top enforcer. Over the next decade, Vukota forged a reputation as a tough scrapper and punishing forechecker who could occasionally pop in a goal. He was suspended several times by the league for on ice behaviors, and this added to his growing tough-guy reputation. He went on to become the Islanders' career penalty minutes leader (1,879), but his one-dimensional style resulted in a demotion to the Utah Grizzlies of the IHL in 1996–97. He split the 1997–98 season between the Tampa Bay Lightning and Montreal Canadiens in what was his last year in the NHL, surpassing 2,000 career penalty minutes, and then played two more seasons with the Grizzlies in the IHL before retiring.

Despite not being a major goal scorer, with only 17 career goals across 575 NHL matches, he did score a hat trick against the Washington Capitals, in a 5-3 Islanders win at the Capital Centre on October 20, 1989.[1] He was nicknamed "Mick the Quick" and "Mickster".

NHL statistics

    Regular season   Playoffs
Season Team League GP G A Pts PIM GP G A Pts PIM
1987–88 New York Islanders NHL 17 1 0 1 82 2 0 0 0 23
1988–89 New York Islanders NHL 48 2 2 4 237 — — — — —
1989–90 New York Islanders NHL 76 4 8 12 290 1 0 0 0 17
1990–91 New York Islanders NHL 60 2 4 6 238 — — — — —
1991–92 New York Islanders NHL 74 0 6 6 293 — — — — —
1992–93 New York Islanders NHL 74 2 5 7 216 15 0 0 0 16
1993–94 New York Islanders NHL 72 3 1 4 237 4 0 0 0 17
1994–95 New York Islanders NHL 40 0 2 2 109 — — — — —
1995–96 New York Islanders NHL 33 1 1 2 106 — — — — —
1996–97 New York Islanders NHL 17 1 0 1 71 — — — — —
1997–98 Tampa Bay Lightning NHL 42 1 0 1 116 — — — — —
1997–98 Montreal Canadiens NHL 22 0 0 0 76 1 0 0 0 0
NHL totals 575 17 29 46 2071 23 0 0 0 73

See also

References

  1. ↑


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