Chat with Robin Lehner

No way and no how, could Robin Lehner allow the Vancouver Canucks to score. Not at this time, not in this game.
So when Canucks captain Bo Horvat feathered a perfect pass on to the waiting stick of winger Brock Boeser, the Vegas Golden Knights goalie had to get across his crease and snare the sailing puck out of the net's grasp. He didn't have a choice. He simply had to do it.
And he did.

What would have happened had Lehner failed? Had he not risen to the occasion and made the save of a career? We'll never know but the probability of the Golden Knights coming back to win a Game 7 with Thatcher Demko doing his best brick wall impersonation at the other end of the ice would have to be considered poor.
Demko had stoned Vegas two nights in a row to bring the Canucks back from a 3-1 deficit and to force a Game 7. The California native carried his shutout streak of more than five periods into the third period. Sweden's Lehner knew he had to be perfect at the other end.
"I knew I needed a shutout for us to win," said Lehner.
Lehner did indeed pick up the shutout to lead Vegas to a Game 7 win. He added another shutout in Game 2 of the Western Conference Final to make it four so far in this postseason to tie Marc-Andre Fleury's franchise record for shutouts in a single Stanley Cup tournament.
Golden Knights winger Mark Stone played with Lehner in the AHL and in the NHL in Ottawa. He isn't surprised with Lehner's playoff performance.
"He's a great teammate. Always has been and always will be. He works hard, plays hard. We're in a unique situation where we can play either one of our goalies, which is pretty rare for sure," said Stone. "Three shutouts in the six games he started in this series so he gave us a chance to win all those games. The last two that we lost, obviously we just couldn't get any run support for him. He's given us a chance every night. The same could be said about both of our goalies."
Following the series win, Stone and Lehner shared an embrace.
"I think we're both pretty emotional guys. We were pretty fired up. We both want to win. Having a guy who is in the same situation as you, I think that can be said about all teammates, we're all here with the ultimate goal to win," said Stone. "If you can escape a series like that battling some adversity that makes it even more exciting. I think there was just a lot of energy from him and I."
Lehner was nominated for the Vezina in 2018-19 and shared the Jennings Trophy with Thomas Greiss. Lehner also won the Masterton Trophy that season.
Over the last few seasons, Lehner has been elite. In the last two seasons among goalies with a minimum of 70 games played, Lehner has posted a .925 save percentage (4th overall) and a Goals Saved Above Expected number of 23.92 (2nd overall). The 29-year-old isn't just elite; he's one of the best in the game right now.
Lehner joined VGK.com last weekend prior to the start of the Western Conference Final for a chat.
Gary Lawless: You're going pretty well right now with three shutouts in the last series. Can you get better?
Robin Lehner: I don't think it's about being better. I think the environment is going to get better for me as a goalie. I think both the Chicago series and the Vancouver series were a little bit special in a way where we were a pretty dominant team. We're a very structured team. We had the most possession, but we also played two really dangerous offensive teams that both strive on odd man rushes. That was just two series that were very complicated for a goalie or for a team in general to have in certain way. It's kind of hard to see from the outside but they're very, very complicated games mentally for the defense. Especially when there's a lot of things at stake.
GL: You didn't get here until the trade deadline and then the pause came, so I'd imagine it's kind of hard to feel part of the team. The Vancouver series was one of those times where you went through a lot of adversity as a team and won it together. Did you really feel like a member of the Golden Knights after Game 7?
RL: Definitely. I think this team has done a hell of a job being good teammates. They're a really close group. There's really good guys on this team, so it's been easy. But it's a tough situation. Not many people talk about it, but there's a reason why people don't trade for goalies. It's a very big position on a team. It's a big pressure position. It takes a lot of faith and chemistry with your teammates and get your teammates behind you. It's been a tough situation for sure. I think we've all handled it and delivered on expectations so far, but right now the only thing we want to do is win a cup and that's the main goal and that outshines everything else. It is a tough situation for sure to get into a new team and try to get the confidence of the guys. The win in Game 7 was a very hard game to play as a goalie, the last three games of the series actually. I'm just happy I could come up with a couple of big saves and we could get the win and head to the conference finals.
GL: Have you had a bigger save in your career than the one in game 7?
RL: I mean it's Game 7 and we're going to the conference final so it has to be up there. It's also one of those things that's the downside of trading a goalie. The fanbase and the reporters, they didn't know much about me. I've been in the shadows a little bit. I had a few good years in Buffalo and then everything that happened, happened. And then I had some good years in Long Island and Chicago. That was on the East Coast and then in Chicago, I just don't think a lot of people knew me as a goalie and I made a lot of those saves this year in Chicago. I had some of those in Long Island, too. I am mostly a positional goalie and a reading goalie. I might not look the same as Fleury or a lot of other really acrobatic goalies are in there. I just don't move as much. I'm a little deeper in the net and I try to make most of my saves with my chest and my arms. Sometimes that looks like the game is really easy, but it's the same types of shots. I just don't put myself in positions to make those types of saves that often.
GL: When you combine your last two seasons your save percentage, and this is just goalies who have played a minimum of 70 games over the last two years, your save percentage is fourth at .925. And your goals saved is above expected at 23.82, and that's second among the 39 goalies in the NHL that have played a minimum of 70 games. There's an argument that you're one of the best goalies in hockey right now.
RL: I definitely wouldn't go there. What I put on myself is I try to be as consistent as I can. You can go back three years, four years, five years and get the same amount of results because when you're on a winning team as a goalie you get all the credit and if you're on a losing team you get all the blame. I had 92 percent in two of my seasons in Buffalo and I was one of the better statistical goalies in my third year when everything went to shit in Buffalo. I went and spiraled away for a month until I went to rehab. I think I had the best save percentage at home in Buffalo up until late January. So that's always been consistent. What people don't understand is, maybe I don't make all the flashy saves backdoor all the time. I try to get there on my knees and I'm a little bit deeper, but the one thing people don't see is what I pride myself the most with is clear line shots. How many goals over the last bunch of years have beaten me when I see the puck and they come down the wing or in the slot or whatnot and I see the puck and I'm not screened. That doesn't happen very often. Maybe one or two goals since I got here in Vegas. I think I had one in Calgary where it was a two-on-one and I got beat five hole. The rest of the goals here have been tips or rebounds or screens, which is also something I'm usually pretty good at, but we play a bit of a different system here in Vegas where we want the D-men to front a lot of shots so it's kind of like a double screen. It's taken some time for me to get used to that. It's been pushing me a little deeper in the net, a lot deeper than I would like to. Me and the goalie coach have been working on that the last couple weeks to get out further while I'm screened. You can look at the statistics however you want. The biggest thing is I'm trying to be as consistent as I can be. If I don't have a good game, it's not a terrible game. I think for teams like Vegas it's important that there's a consistency there because if you can make sure that your worst game is letting in like two or three goals, this team would still win. That's what I pride myself in. I just try to be as consistent as I can.
GL: You mentioned Fleury. It's not a secret he's very popular, and for good reason, but you have played well and have seen the majority of the action. Has that been an issue?
RL: It's been tough. It's a hell of an opportunity but again, this is also kind of breaking the mold where goalies get traded. It doesn't happen often and that's for a reason because the position is what it is. I explained it a few weeks ago I think on an interview. I can't help where I'm going, right? I play hockey. That's my profession. I went to Long Island and Greiss was the fan favorite there. Hell of a fan base there that really took me in, they're going to be special to my heart for a long time, but it took some time there. Then I went to Chicago and Corey Crawford, obviously one of the best goalies I've ever played with. I kind of took over the net there for a little bit and it was a tough situation because you have so much respect for these guys and there's a team aspect too. They're popular guys in the room. Then I come here and Fleury's probably - his resume speaks for itself. I've said it many times, he's going to go down as one of the best of the game and he's such a fantastic person. So it adds a few other layers of pressure and a little bit of hesitation here and there because it doesn't really matter what I do at times. It doesn't feel like you get that much credit even if you win seven in a row or you have a couple of shutouts or whatever it is. It's like "oh it's an easy game" or "he doesn't do much" because the way I play looks that way. I might save the puck in a less entertaining way. It's only negative which is mind boggling to me because I'm just here doing my job and doing my best trying to help the team win. I'm not the coach. I don't put myself in the net. I just try to play as hard as I can and do my job. The fanbase is one thing. I have full respect for them and fans can think whatever they want, but it's been the writers and that stuff too. There's just so much negativity around it. I've been kind of surprised by that, especially because they don't know me either. They're are so many inaccurate things about me as a player being thrown out there. It's always comparing me versus Fleury and we're two totally different goalies, totally different styles. At the end of the day he makes amazing saves and is so acrobatic and is such an aggressive goalie. He could have 20 shots and make a couple of fantastic saves and steals the game. I don't do those saves, just because I do them in another manner it's an easy game and I didn't do anything.
GL: How has Fleury supported you?
RL: He's been amazing. I can't say enough about Marc-Andre. He's a true professional. He's been an amazing teammate. Everyone on the team loves him. He's a huge part of the room. He's very supportive to me between periods, before games and he wants to win. That's the biggest challenge for me as a goalie coming into a new team is just earning the respect of the players, of the guys. That's what you need to do and obviously it's been hard at times wondering how the team feels about me playing but they've been great. They're all professionals and they've all been very supportive, but that's a hard hump to get over. The rest of it is noise. It'd be nice to get some credit where credit is due sometimes.
GL: What went through your mind when Shea Theodore scored?
RL: Finally. It was incredible. Demko comes in and plays out of his mind. The guys were playing really well. The last three games were probably the three hardest mental games that I played in my career. We were playing so well as a team, and that goalie is playing really well. He's getting a little lucky, but he was playing really well. Low scoring games obviously. For me as a goalie, ten minutes in between shots not having that much to do. But Vancouver is such a skilled team. When they actually get a chance, it's a good chance. It's hard. It's hard mentally to stay on top of everything. You know that every chance is worth so much because the other goalie is playing so well. One goal probably means we lose the game. You have to get over that mentally and just try to get to the next level. That's what it was for me in that game. That was even tougher because I knew that going into the game, I had to have a shutout, otherwise we probably won't win. They had six shots or something through two periods, but four of them were pretty good chances. Then they started getting a little bit more in the third and finally we scored that goal. It was huge. I give a lot of credit the guys for battling really hard. They played a great game. We just couldn't get the puck in the net.
GL: Reading social media before Game 7, there was a lot of pressure on you and Coach DeBoer, did you see any of that?
RL: We did for sure. At the end of the day, coaching position and the goalie position has the most pressure on them. It was a must win game. If we lose that game, it would be probably be our heads. That's what I'm talking about. The media in Vegas has really fueled this divisiveness around the team with this whole situation. Starting a controversy that's pretty ridiculous. We're all teammates and we're all doing this for the same goal. It just makes it so much harder and so much more pressure. It doesn't matter what type of goal or what type of game, it's just so much negativity. It's pretty ruthless out there right now and it shouldn't be. It should be we're all one team and we're all fans for one team. I get it, but it's been spun out of proportion because of certain people and media that just doesn't have a clue about what they're talking about. I look at things. Every time I play, there are all bad statistics and you can find bad statistics in any scenario for any player in the league if you want to spin it that way. But you can also find good ones. It's always been spun bad against me and then good against the other, so it looks like the coaching staff are doing a bad job. In the back-to-back scenario, people are showing that I am 1-7 in back-to-backs, but it's not accurate. My win came in the one back-to-back that I got on Long Island, I didn't have any in Chicago, and the rest of them were in Buffalo. Please tell me a goalie that is going to win more back-to-backs in Buffalo than what I did. Then you talk about records and all that stuff, records in the regular-season during postseason go out of the window. It really does. I think that's proven over and over and over again. Every season, teams that had a better record during the regular season get beat. It happens all the time. It's just being spun in a way that is kind of ludicrous, in my opinion. Just a lack of knowledge about me as a goalie and as a person. I've played on a bunch of different types of teams now and have been pretty successful on all of them. I'm just here to do my job. At the end of the day, I've seen everything from these guys like I can't steal games, cant move etc. They missed all of the ones I had in Chicago this year. I had a pretty good run on Long Island too. In Buffalo, if I didn't steal a game, we had 40-45 shots a game there. It's just a lot of inaccurate information out there right now. People that know hockey know what I am doing on the ice and how consistent I have been. But there are people feeding the fans information from their perspective's, which isn't necessarily true and just stirring the pot in a pretty crucial time of our playoff run.
GL: What would winning a Stanley Cup for Vegas mean to you?
RL: It would be a dream come true; I think for this whole team. The Vegas fanbase is so passionate. It's insane how fast it has grown there. It's the best arena to play in for sure. It's a hell of a city and organization. Everything is perfect. It would be really cool to win with this team, for sure.