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Growing up in Long Island, Linda Cohn was shy and didn’t have great self-esteem.

Strapping on a set of goalie pads and stopping pucks for her local boys’ team helped change that, and these days Cohn is one of the most powerful women in sports media as a SportsCenter anchor for ESPN.

Yet on Monday, Cohn was back on the ice, again stopping pucks.

She was one of 58 participants who showed up for the Florida Panthers’ “Goal of a Lifetime” contest. After the NHL team lost both of its goalies to injury and had to sign goalie coach Robb Tallas to an emergency one-game contract earlier this month, the team came up with the contest to pick a goalie to serve as a backup to its regular netminders at an upcoming practice.

“It was a genius idea by the Panthers to come up with this contest,” Cohn said. “They took something negative and turned it into something positive for the fans.”

Cohn, 55 and a mother of two, was the first to arrive at the BB&T Center in Sunrise, Fla., and pictures were plentiful of her strolling into the arena, carrying her own hockey bag, while cameras filmed every second.

Cohn had plenty of support on social media, and she answered most of the well-wishers prior to the afternoon skate on her Twitter account, @lindacohn.

“Thanks for all the tweets of support!!” she wrote. “My goal — have fun, do my best! Sounds like advice I give my kids.”

There were ESPN cameras all over the arena covering her participation, and she was fully mic’d up during the contest. Cohn also interviewed the other goalie candidates who were successful during the event. ESPN cut into SportsCenter to show Cohn at various intervals live throughout the day. Hockey analyst Barry Melrose was also on hand to comment on the event.

“I am glad that ESPN is supporting this opportunity and is covering it as an event,” Cohn said before the event. “In addition to SportsCenter filming me and having me with a microphone, I will also be wearing a GoPro helmet cam, and we are going to be cutting in and out of the show with the event.”

Cohn said she fell in love with the game, and her beloved New York Rangers, thanks to her father and brothers.

“I grew up in a hockey family and I followed my dad’s footsteps,” Cohn said. “I’m not the typical Jewish girl from Long Island. I always played in the street with the boys.”

Those hockey games helped her develop confidence. Even though she was always covered with pads and a goalie mask, she was able to get satisfaction from knowing that it was her behind the equipment and that she was capable of playing with the boys.

“I was a kid with very low self-esteem. I had some flaws, but I was able to shine as a hockey player because I had some skills,” Cohn said. “I always had something to look forward to because I was a hockey junkie.”

Cohn played for a boys’ hockey team at her local high school and served as a backup goalie. She parlayed that effort into a collegiate hockey career at State University of New York at Oswego and was eventually elected into the school’s hall of fame.

On Monday, Cohn was all about enjoying the experience.

The last time she saw game-like action was in 2012 when she participated in Luc Robitaille’ Celebrity Shootout. Last year she took the ice just messing around and faced about 30 shots in a pick-up setting.

“I look around and see all these fabulous goalies that also took advantage of this opportunity to live a dream,” she said. “That’s why the Panthers called it ‘Goal of a Lifetime.’ That’s what it is. To be out on an NHL ice surface, you can’t even imagine how great it is.

“I’m still on a high, and it’s going to take a long time to come down from it. I’m so thankful that I had an opportunity to be part of the ‘Goal of a Lifetime’ contest.”

Notebook

• The Panthers announced Bill Ruggiero and Dustin Smith as the “Goal of a Lifetime” finalists. Ruggiero, a former semi-pro goalie, is the brother of four-time U.S. Olympian Angela Ruggiero. Smith played for played for Middle Tennessee State University.

• Goalies from near and far traveled to South Florida for Monday’s contest. Forty-eight came from Florida, five from Canada and two from New Jersey. Darcy Ramstead of Red Deer, Alberta, traveled the farthest.

“I jumped on a plane, flew into Dallas, three and a half hours to Dallas, had an hour layover and then flew into Fort Lauderdale,” Ramstead said. “It’s been pretty exciting since.”

The Panthers said they got 1,500 applicants from 42 states and 15 countries before narrowing the list of invitees to 65.

• Nick Dube came from Burlington, Vt., where he is a goalie for the University of Vermont’s ACHA Division-2 Club team.

“I’m having a lot of fun out here,” said Dube. “I can’t even put it into words.”

• The goalies joined Tallas and former Panthers goalie Tomas Vokoun on the ice.

“For these people to get a chance to be on the ice in an NHL arena and to have ex-NHL players shooting on them is just a great experience,” Vokoun said.

• Brittany Bugalski, a goalie for the U.S. Women’s National Under-18 Team, was selected to participate in the contest but elected not to due to concerns about how it might affect her NCAA eligibility. Bugalski has committed to play at Northeastern University.

Story from Red Line Editorial, Inc.