Knights on Ice — The Big Guy

Following the morning skate, when Coach DeBoer was asked who would be in goal, he responded, “The big guy.” At first, some of the members of the media were not completely sure who he meant; Marc-André Fleury has always been the Big Guy for this franchise from Day 1.

Last night, the “big guy,” Robin Lehner, moved the VGK to a 4-2 win over Buffalo in front of 18,404  at T-Mobile and vaulted the VGK to a 6-point lead on top of the Pacific Division. This is the biggest lead any team has had this entire season in the Pacific Division.

The funny part about the Big Guy is he really doesn’t move much compared to Fleury, who is very aggressive in challenging the shooters and moving out to cut their angles down. Robin is the exact opposite: He sits back and uses his size to occupy a large portion of the net. Listed as six-four and 240 lbs., he is all of that if not more. Fleury is six-two and 185 pounds. So you can see how their body sizes dictate their style of play.

You could sense the sold-out crowd was fully behind Lehner right from the go. They’re fully aware that if Robin is successful here as the backup to Fleury, it takes a lot of wear and tear and pressure off the Flower to have to strap the team on his back and get them across the finish line of 82 games and then toward the ultimate goal of 16 additional wins starting the 2^nd week in April.

This is the first time in the VGK’s entire existence that they have a formidable goaltending tandem. Post-game, Coach DeBoer revealed, also for the first time in VGK history, who the starting goaltender will be almost 48 hours ahead of their next game. In the Gallant era, there was Dave Prior, the VGK goaltending coach, who was actually hired before Gallant. Prior pretty much had the say on who would start game to game and that information was kept a deep dark secret until the day of the game at best.

Things under PDB have changed. He made it clear in his presser after the morning skate yesterday when he said: “I pick the goaltender.” And he solidified that by answering the question I posed to him post-game. Right before my question, he made it clear that the VGK now have 2 quality starting goaltenders who will share the workload. Which prompted me to ask him if Fleury and Lehner would alternate game by game. He answered that question by stating Fleury will be in net on Sunday vs. L.A. Kings—a first for us media guys who aren’t used to having this information this early.

The night didn’t start as planned when newly acquired forward Dominik Kahun scored on the very first shot that Lehner faced as a VGK. Kahun came over to Buffalo from the Pittsburgh Penguins at the trade deadline, as did Robin Lehner, so both new players for these two teams played a role in the first goal of the game.

As of late, all the newest VGK have been scoring in the first game as a VGK. So was this a way for Robin to have his own VGK record as the only VGK goaltender to give up a goal on the first shot he faced? After the Edmonton game, Fleury joked that with all the new players scoring in the first game, the pressure was on Robin. Little did Fleury know just how true his joke would become.

Robin was asked about giving up the first goal on the very first shot of the game. He said, “You just look at the next shot and try to make the next save. I thought we got better as the game went on and obviously had a great jump in the third and got a couple of goals to settle it down.”

That opening goal was caused by the defensive duo of Holden and Whitecloud, who put the puck in the middle of the ice, instead of going up and along the boards exiting the defensive zone. The rest of the way, however, Robin was stellar, stopping the next 32 shots before Jeff Skinner put the 2^nd Buffalo goal behind him with just 12 seconds left in the game. At that time, Buffalo’s goaltender Carter Hutton was pulled for the extra skater.

Of the 34 shots that Buffalo had on Robin, only 6 came off rebounds, which is a statement about Robin’s control of the initial shot and finally having a solid defense in front of him. His last team, Chicago, was a defensive nightmare for Robin. He remarked post-game that he’ll have to get used to having a solid defense in front of him, similar to the NY Islander defense he played with, which led to his nomination for the Vezina Trophy as the top goaltender of the year.

This is the first time in 229 regular-season games and 27 playoff games that the VGK have 2 goaltenders who are legitimate starters and not just your team with the typical backup goaltender. No disrespect to Malcolm Subban, but the lack of games played was part of his downfall. It prevented the coaching staff and Dave Prior from having confidence in naming him the starting goaltender in times other than back-to-backers or when Fleury was unavailable or injured.

This spells trouble for the other 7 teams in the Western Conference come playoff time and hopefully will be a nightmare for the one team coming out of the Eastern Conference.

With last night’s win, the VGK extended their streak to 8 wins, which ties a franchise record. It also presents a good possibility that on Sunday, Marc-Andre Fleury will have a better than average chance of leading the team to a record 9-game winning streak.

Reilly Smith had 2 goals last night in the 3rd-period after William Karlsson’s scored his 14^th goal of the season Karlsson’s goal would have been the game-winner except Jeff Skinner scored with 12 seconds left in the game which then made Reilly Smith’s goal as the game winner, Zach Whitecloud recorded his first NHL point.

Mark Stone was scratched with an undisclosed injury and Tomas Nosek left the game halfway through the first period and never returned. Nosek’s injury appeared to concussion-related and he was being evaluated last night.

Nicholas Roy opened the scoring for the VGK off a silky pass from Nick Cousins, who once again contributed to the score sheet in just his 2^nd game. Roy had Buffalo goaltender Hutton completely fooled as he went from forehand to backhand to forehand, then dropped his left shoulder like he was going back to his backhand, but didn’t. Hutton didn’t have a chance.

Over the last few games, the VGK have completely stifled 4 of the best players in the league: McDavid and Draisaiti from Edmonton, Ovechkin from Washington, and last night Jack Eichel, who sits at 77 points on 35 goals and 42 assists in 62 games. Eichel has the 2^nd most points in the league among American-born players. Patrick Kane of Chicago is number 1 at 78 points with 28 goals and 50 assists. Eichel was a -3 for the game, a testament to the defense that has been on display recently.

Defense wins championships and right now the VGK are playing defense like no other.

My 3 stars of the Game: Robin Lehner (who was in a high-pressure situation, playing behind Fleury who just pitched a shutout 2 nights ago), Reilly Smith (2 goals), William Karlsson (1G and who seems to have regained his scoring touch)

Next Game is Sunday at 7:30 vs. L.A. Kings

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