Unmasked: Mentorship from veteran goalies invaluable for success at position

Jake Oettinger is grateful Ben Bishop was still with the Dallas Stars by the time Oettinger broke into the NHL six seasons ago and that Bishop was willing to share lessons from his own 11-year career in the League.

The advice wasn’t always about technique or tactics, but about life as a goalie, and the challenges of playing arguably the hardest position in sports in the world’s best league.

“No one really knows what it's like unless you've been in that position before,” Oettinger said. “Even coaches don't know what it's like to be relied upon for 60 nights a year and just the stress, so to have a guy who knows what it's like to be there every night is huge.

"Even to this day, I still chat with him all the time. I was very lucky. Not a lot of guys have mentors like that.”

That’s because the list of active goalies with Bishop’s experience has shrunk considerably over the past seven seasons. Since Roberto Luongo retired in 2019 after 19 seasons in the NHL, the list of prominent workhorse goalies to retire includes Henrik Lundqvist, Carey Price, Pekka Rinne, Tuukka Rask, Ryan Miller, Braden Holtby, Jimmy Howard, Corey Crawford, Devan Dubnyk, Mike Smith, Craig Anderson, Cam Ward, Martin Jones and, after last season, Marc-Andre Fleury.

It's a list that includes seven goalies with more than a decade of experience each as an NHL starter.

Only two active NHL goalies have similar levels of experience to share: Jonathan Quick of the New York Rangers (19 NHL seasons) and Sergei Bobrovsky of the Florida Panthers (16). Connor Hellebuyck of the Winnipeg Jets and Andrei Vasilevskiy of the Tampa Bay Lightning each is in his 10th League season as a No. 1 goalie.

Though there are other goalies who have been in the League for more than a decade, including stints as the starter, a lot of valuable experience has departed.

Chicago Blackhawks goalie Spencer Knight counts himself lucky to have been around two of those goalies in Bobrovsky and Luongo during his first four-plus seasons with the Panthers.

“You always think, ‘Oh my gosh, like my world’s caving in,’” Knight said, citing the emotions that can come after tough games. “Having all these people around me that I can lean on has been really helpful for me in the start of my career.

"Every time there’s a situation where I’ve been put in a little adversity or whatnot, I’d talk to 'Bob' or I talk to 'Lu' and they’re like, ‘Yeah, I remember when that happened to me.’ Then you realize, you know what, you’re not the only one that goes through this. And it’s not the end of the world.”

Filip Gustavsson was similarly grateful to play with Fleury during Fleury’s final four seasons in the NHL with the Minnesota Wild, and said the lessons learned were important ones.

“You need to feel comfortable with your surroundings," Gustavsson said. "You don't want to be nervous that if you make a mistake your superstar is going to complain about the goalies. Fleury was super helpful making me feel comfortable in the room and see hockey for what it is. It's about the fun part of it. I used to say the best time of hockey I played was before I got paid to play, because then it was just a fun thing I went and did every day because I loved it.

“Then you start to get paid with your first contract, it puts a little pressure on you of 'I have to perform every day to keep my job,' and Fleury really helped me see it for the game it is, and to try and bring back that old feeling. That's the aspect I try to bring on the days I have a tougher time.”

Cam Talbot of the Detroit Red Wings is in his 13th season in the NHL and remembers the importance of lessons learned coming in with the Rangers, Lundqvist and their long-time goaltending coach Benoit Allaire, who last season moved into a director role.

“The dialogues in that goalie room and the amount of knowledge I was able to soak in from the two of them was incredible,” Talbot said. “I don't think I would have been in the NHL without signing with the Rangers and getting to spend three years in the minors working with Benoit Allaire first, but when you get to the NHL and get to watch Henrik day in and day out, and what it takes to be a pro -- you talk about being a mentor, there's not a better guy to learn from when it comes to that stuff just by watching him on and off the ice.”

Those little details are so important, and more easily digested coming from another goalie.

“If you bring up two young goalies and they don't have anyone to learn that from, maybe it takes them longer to develop and get up to NHL speed,” Talbot said. “If you have a guy that's been around and can help them with those things as far as preparation and planning, workouts, days off, treatments, all the stuff to that goes into a long season to keep your body in the shape that you need, that benefits everybody. At this point in my career, I’d relish the opportunity. It'd be a fun transition from coming in to sticking around long enough to become a mentor.”

Oettinger said he was happy to have the mentorship of Bishop, who was trying to come back from a degenerative knee injury during Bishop’s first two seasons in Dallas. The injury ultimately forced Bishop to retire.

“I owe a lot to him,” Oettinger said. “I was so young, so raw, so he helped me technically and tactically, but even more with the mindset because you can eat yourself alive in this game and just having that level head on your shoulders is, I think, more important than any physical or God-given talent.

"What you tell yourself every day is more important, and it's easier said than done. I struggle with that to this day, so I haven't mastered it, and I don't think you ever do.”

But being able to talk to someone who has covered similar ground certainly helps.