Unmasked: Even when leaving an open net, goalies still have a plan

VANCOUVER -- Rick Wamsley was an NHL goalie for 13 seasons, an NHL goaltending coach for another 15, and now scouts goalies for the Colorado Avalanche, so he knows a lot about the position and the tendencies of players trying to score on goalies.

That includes how shooters react to seeing an open net, and how best to defend it.

“Nine times out of 10 the guy looking at an open net is going to put the puck right in the middle of the net," Wamsley said, "and if you know that as a goalie you can use that. It was my thought process when I played and ended up in a desperate situation and something I talked about with all my goalies I coached: Keep competing and get something in the middle of the net.”

It makes sense from a psychological standpoint: no one wants to try and pick a corner on an empty net and risk hitting a post or missing. Though there’s often more that goes into those desperation-moment saves from the goalie’s perspective, it’s worth keeping that nugget in mind.

“I feel like when somebody has an open net, the shot ends up not being on the ice," Edmonton Oilers goalie Calvin Pickard said, "so you’re just try to get something to middle part of the net.”

Pickard points to a save against Tampa Bay Lightning forward Brandon Hagel on Nov. 20, after a two-way passing play, first low-to-high, then across the ice, that created an open-net situation.

“He had a wide-open net and I just dove, but I didn't cover the bottom part of the ice,” Pickard said. “I just kind of dove in the middle part of the net. I feel like that's where most pucks go in the open net is the middle part, but I've never really thought of it that way necessarily. I'm not always like, ‘Oh, that guy has an open net, I'm going to do this.' It's all instinct.”

That’s an important distinction for goalies. There are very few absolutes when it comes to the position, rarely one “best” way to do anything, and that includes managing an open net.

“It's such a split-second decision because the game is so fast," Washington Capitals goalie Charlie Lindgren said, "so a lot of times with an open net, you're literally looking at the puck and you're like, 'What body part can I get over there?'”

Lindgren singled out a pad-stack save in an open-net situation against the Nashville Predators on Jan. 11 to prove his point.

“You're seeing what their blade is showing," he said, "and that's where the goaltending position is so cool, because you're making these decisions in milliseconds and what that puck and what that blade is telling you is what you're going to end up trying to do.”

For Buffalo Sabres goalie Alex Lyon, the priority is coverage along the ice.

“There’s a crazy statistic I learned six or seven years ago, that 60 or 65 percent of all NHL goals are scored on the ice,” Lyon said. “The vast majority of goals in the NHL are scored along the ice, and it changed the way I play the game. If you seal the ice first, you give yourself a very good chance. That’s just how I think about it: Seal the ice and then move my body into it.”

Sabres playing partner Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen's priority also is sealing the bottom of the net -- “cover the easiest option for the shooter if he whiffs on it,” he said -- but he also heeds the advice of long-time Buffalo goaltending coach Mike Bales about covering the middle of empty nets.

“Bales said if there's an empty net, it's crazy how middle they always shoot the puck,” Luukkonen said. “So always take the middle of the crease, don't try to let anything through you.”

It’s one or the other for Filip Gustavsson of the Minnesota Wild.

“It's instinctual,” Gustavsson said. “If you throw yourself like a soccer save, you should get in the middle of the net with a glove. But otherwise I think a low stick is good too on the ice, because usually the players panic a little bit too, and just try and get it toward the net, and that can save it.”

Brandon Bussi wasn’t thinking about middle-of-the-net coverage when the Carolina Hurricanes rookie robbed Sabres forward Tage Thompson on a 2-on-0 back-and-forth pass during a 2-1 win Monday.

“In a moment like that you’re trying not to commit too much on a pass or a fake,” Bussi said. “I definitely was thinking a second pass was an option, and at the end of the day just try and get as much of my body over on the second pass for the shot.”

That shot ended up in his glove. But as replays showed, it was headed for the middle of the net.

Which is why Wamsley shares that lesson about empty-net situations with each young goalie he teaches how to read and anticipate plays better through his company, Goalie U.

It’s also why one of his all-time favorite teaching moments came during his time as the goaltending coach of the Ottawa Senators, with goalie Andrew Hammond facing a cross-ice pass against Carolina on March 17, 2015 that left Hurricanees center Jordan Staal staring at an open net from the right face-off circle after Hammond originally pushed across to a shot threat in the middle of the ice.

“Where’s it going? Right in the middle of the net, so sometimes all these great saves aren’t exactly great shots,” Wamsley said. “If Staal puts it off the post and in, God bless him. But I’ve watched many, many east/west scoring situations and most guys shoot in the middle. And if you know that, it's amazing how many great saves you can make just by getting something into the middle.”