Yes, indeed, I plead guilty. This year, all accepted knowledge of the National Hockey League playoffs is out the window. Gone! This year, the Stanley Cup playoffs are still about The Goalie. They’re just not about the “highly-regarded” Goalie.
Let me explain. I believe that the team with the best goaltender will win the Stanley Cup. As Brian Burke once said, “We call it the Stanley Cup playoffs because we can’t call it Goalie.” The two-month tournament that we know as the Stanley Cup playoffs is usually decided by the goaltender who gets red-hot just at the right time. He doesn’t necessarily have to be considered a “great” goalie. Just a hot one.
This year, however, the goaltender issue has been strange. It’s still about the hot goalie. It’s just kind of shocking who the hot goalies are. Roberto Luongo? Bust. Marty Brodeur? Long gone. Evgeni Nabokov? Taken out in four in the Western Final. Marc-Andre Fleury? Out in the second round.
This year, the fast, skilled Chicago Blackhawks will face the gritty, defensively responsible Philadelphia Flyers in the Stanley Cup final. The Hawks goalie is Antti Niemi, a guy who was considered the anchor around the neck of a good hockey team. He was the reason the Hawks weren’t going to win. The Flyers goalie was the journeyman American, Brian Boucher, but he got hurt and now its the Canadian journeyman Michael Leighton, a guy who was originally drafted by the Blackhawks, played most of his career in the AHL and had played only 103 games in 10 NHL seasons when the playoffs started. Huh?
Heading into the final, Leighton — Philly’s No. 2 goaltender — leads all playoff goalies with a 1.45 goals against average and a .948 save percentage (Boucher is third: 2.33, .915). But Leighton has played only eight games in the post season. There is chance he’ll double that number by the time the playoffs end.
Meanwhile, Niemi is No. 2 on the stats sheet. He has a 2.33 goals against average and a .921 save percentage in 16 games.
Yes, the final two teams in the Stanley Cup tournament have the hottest goaltenders. It’s just hard to imagine both of them will keep up the pace.
But then again, Canada’s Olympic hero Roberto Luongo has been a career playoff bust and Martin Brodeur hasn’t played well in the post-season since 2003.
Remember, it’s not about “great” goalies. It’s about “hot” goalies. It’s just that nobody expected the hot goalies to be Leighton, Niemi and Boucher.
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At 3 o’clock this afternoon, the Tampa Bay Lightning are expected to announce Steve Yzerman as the team’s new general manager.
Interesting choice because after the Red Wings re-signed Ken Holland and Jim Nill, Yzerman was No. 3 in Detroit.