We all love a good crossover, don’t we? Well, hopefully that attitude can also apply to Charles Barkley’s switcheroo while going over NBA highlights in the game between the Clippers and the Nuggets, where the latter won, 120-101! Barkley, who has made his love for the NHL more than known over the years was clearly multitasking while going over the highlights of the third period.
“So now we go to the third, and the Clippers had the first bucket and then the nuggets went 18 to nothing on it.” Kenny Smith can be heard saying to Barkley, who replies in a single breath, “Yeah that was ugly, Thank god, hey, Nathan Mckinnon just scored again too.”
Charles Barkley was referring to the, coincidentally, the third period in game 7 between the Colorado Avalanche and Dallas Stars, and at the third period, things were looking good for the Avalanche! Nathan Mckinnon opened it off with a goal, making it 2-0 to Avalanche and further cementing Mckinnon’s place as a top playoff scorer, he is currently first place in goals for the 2024-2025 season with 7 from this playoff season. He is second in points only to his Mikko Rantanen of the Dallas Stars.
We really got Charles Barkley calling out Nathan MacKinnon goals while doing Denver Nugget highlights pic.twitter.com/DC9VGVwX4n
— B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) May 4, 2025
All this considered, it makes sense that Charles Barkley would draw attention to his goal while Kenny Smith was focusing on the 18 point lead the Nuggets managed to score in the third period. However, some fans who don’t understand Barkley’s longstanding love for the NHL were a little bit confused by the moment, so in case you fall into that category, read on to find out how Barkley has been trying to draw attention to the NHL for years.
Charles Barkley has never hid his love for the NHL, he doesn’t only bring it up during NBA highlights!
Funnily enough, Charles Barkley found his way to hockey through basketball. When he was drafted to the Philadelphia 76ers in 1984, he trained in the same arena as the Philadelphia Flyers, and started to really appreciate the people and the sport. Barkley spoke about how his love really developed by watching games live, saying, “I started going to hockey games and I have to say that while watching on TV is pretty good, but there’s nothing like a hockey game in person. It’s really awesome.” Barkley also reminisced about how he made friends with many of the great players at the time such as Pelle Lindbergh, Ron Hextall and Rick Tocchet.
Barkley has in fact been more and more present in the world of NHL in recent years with him even appearing as a guest on the Bleacher Report about two weeks ago and making his predictions for the first round series. It’s a continuation from last year, where he also made playoff predictions, backing the Edmonton Oilers from the beginning.
Charles Barkley’s predictions for round one winners: Canadiens, Avalanche, Kings, Oilers, Leafs, Lightning (which was a bit of a turn around considering his high praise for Matthew Tkachuk beforehand), Capitals and Hurricanes. Though Barkley was right about a few over there, he was also pretty off, and was perhaps hoping the Avalanche would do better with that McKinnon goal, ughh
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