Buried in Score

One of my favorite hockey sets to be released since I returned to collecting in 2007 is the 2013-14 Score set from Panini.  I like the simplistic design, and the photography is top notch, easily on par with the Upper Deck flagship sets.  I'm not much of a set collector these days, but I enjoy this one enough that I've actually been passively working away at completing it for the past five years or so now.

The set is fairly large by hockey standards, with a checklist 650 cards deep, with another 100 "update" cards printed in 2013-14 Rookie Anthology for a full set size of 750 cards.

Many months ago my buddy Douglas of Sports Cards from the Dollar Store sent me a whopping package that contained literally hundreds of needs for my set!  There's no excuse for taking as long as I did to post a proper thank you, but the one I'm going with anyway is that I've been insanely busy and it took me forever to scan, crop and inventory the sheer number of cards I received.

I picked out a subset to share here in this post, and I think you'll get an idea for just how great the photography is if you're not familiar with the set.

Towards the end of the checklist there's a Season Highlights subset featuring notable moments from the season prior.  This is something I really appreciate, and that I wish we'd see more of in modern sets.  I've always enjoyed cards that can be anchored to an exact moment or milestone.

I'd have to say that my personal favorite from this batch is the RC of one of my current favorite NHL players, Vladimir Tarasenko.  This is one I'd always hoped to pull from a pack myself, but never managed to.  So nice having a friend like Douglas to cross this one off my list for me.

Another notable rookie!

As I mentioned above, I simply love the variation in the photographs that Panini chose for this set.  I can't think of too many other face-off shots in my hockey card collection that are cropped this closely and give you such a good idea of the intensity involved in the draw.

Another great shot here, look how many youngsters are having the time of their lives here in Buffalo.

The team leaders cards are done in an interesting fashion, featuring head shots of the top players for each club.

Here's another interesting one from the Season Highlights subset.  Hard not to admire a 24-game unbeaten streak!  Not surprising that the 'Hawks went on to win the Stanley Cup in 2013.

Getting just about any card of Sid the Kid in trade is significant, but I especially love the jubilant celebration on this one.

Seems I selected just about every Season Highlight card in Douglas' package to show off here today.  I'm starting to think I would have enjoyed an entire set comprised entirely of these.

Celebration shots run rampant throughout the checklist.  Here's not one...

...not two...

...not three (hat trick!)...

...not four...

...not five...

...but six that I randomly chose to give you an idea.  Without putting in the effort to confirm it, my guess would be that there are more goal celebration cards in this set than in any other hockey set out there.

Here's another photograph I really enjoyed.  You don't get to see the faces of goaltenders all that often, and I like the pensive look on Chris Mason's face here.

The checklist is chock full of oddities like these.  I'll confess that I don't purchase too many modern hockey cards these days, but with that being said I think this might be the only one I have featuring the Stars' pre-game intro...

...and this might be the only one featuring a player tossing a puck to the fans.

From player entrances...

...to candid pre-game warm-up shots...

...to some of the best players the game has ever seen, this set truly has it all.

This post is starting to run a bit long in terms of number of images so I'll wrap it up here with a 400th goal...

...a 1,000th assist...

...and another great pre-game intro shot.

Douglas, thanks so much for these fantastic and much-appreciated cards!  My apologies that it took me so long to get to them, but that's not a reflection of how much I enjoyed them whatsoever.

This giant lot brought me all the way up to 602 out of 650 cards in the base set, or 92.6%!  What's more, I received a follow-up package from Douglas not long after that brought me even closer to completion.  I'll be featuring those next.

Thanks as always for stopping by!