WATCH: P-Bruins goalie Brandon Bussi makes insane glove save vs. Hartford

P-Bruins goaltender Brandon Bussi is still waiting for an NHL opportunity.

And though he's still waiting for that chance after Friday night, he'll no longer have to wait to see himself in epic goalie save compilations on TikTok and YouTube, with Bussi on the board with a downright absurd glove save in Friday's head-to-head between the P-Bruins and Wolf Pack at Hartford's XL Center.

The save, which came less than four minutes into the showdown, save Bussi make an absolutely insane desperation effort to lunge from left to right and snare an Alex Belzile look from in tight and without a defender in his way.

As an admitted sucker for anything involving a desperation dive and a goalie pulling out some nastiness with the glove, this one hit in a major way. This was basically as good as it gets for me as a big-save appreciator, really.

It also forced me to take a trip into my own personal wayback machine, as it reminded me of a save that I remembered Tim Thomas making on the Maple Leafs' Francois Beauchemin in an overtime game in Toronto almost 15 years ago.

As for Bussi, this was the prettiest of what finished as a 23-save evening for the 26-year-old on the way to a 6-2 win for Providence and his 15th win of the season.

It's been a bit of a different year from what had previously been established as the standard for Bussi down on the farm ─ Bussi has taken a backseat to AHL All-Star Michael DiPietro (23-8-2 with a .928 save percentage in 38 games this season) for the majority of the season ─ and Bussi is still posting the worst numbers of his AHL career to date, with career-worsts in both goals against average (2.77) and save percentage (.907). But the 6-foot-5 has certainly been surging of late, with a .923 save percentage over his last nine outings dating back to Mar. 14.

A pending unrestricted free agent, and after going unclaimed on waivers earlier this season, it'll be interesting to see what the future holds for Bussi. It does seem like he's been surpassed on the organizational depth chart by DiPietro (a pending free agent in his own right and expected to garner significant interest from other teams), but if DiPietro does in fact leave for a clearer NHL opportunity elsewhere, Bussi could be right back in the thick of things as the Bruins' No. 3 goaltender.

Of course, much of what happens with Bussi (and DiPietro) could come down to what the Bruins do with Joonas Korpisalo and if the Bruins explore the trade market for the veteran goaltender.

Acquired in the trade that sent Linus Ullmark to Ottawa last June, the Bruins have given Korpisalo just 23 starts through 80 games this year, and Korpisalo spoke openly about the difficulties of sitting for long stretches following his last outing (a loss against the Sabres). In addition to Korpisalo's own struggles with not playing enough, there's also the fact that playing a $3 million backup just 23 times over the course of a season is not what you would consider strong cap economics. It instead gives the Bruins an $11.25 million goalie room cap hit that is simply too expensive for such slanted deployment.

Signed out of Western Michigan University by the Bruins as a college free agent in 2022, Bussi has compiled a 63-31-11 record with a .915 save percentage in 111 career games with AHL Providence.