Laviolette mum on goalie choice

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Predators coach Peter Laviolette on Thursday had his third opportunity to commit to Pekka Rinne as his starting goalie for Game 3 of the Stanley Cup final.

It went similarly to first two.

The Nashville coach declined to say whether Rinne, who saw his superlative playoff performance crater at PPG Paints Arena in Games 1 and 2, would play over backup Juuse Saros.

Laviolette did the same on Wednesday night after pulling Rinne in the third period of the Penguins’ 4-1 win, opting twice instead for generalities over how good Rinne had been up to this series.

“Pekka has been excellent for us all year long,” Laviolette said after Wednesday’s game.

“There’s things that we the could have done. All three goals in the third period were odd-man rushes.”

In the final, Rinne has allowed eight goals on 36 shots, continuing his streak of poor play against the Penguins and generally serving as the X-factor, in a negative way, for his team.

If he’ll have the opportunity to bounce back, Laviolette isn’t telling us just yet.

“I said it a couple days ago when everybody was asking about [forwards Mike Fisher and Craig Smith]. I said it then. We don’t talk about the lineup,” Laviolette said.

“When they ask the next day, we’re going to stay consistent with that. We don’t discuss the lineup.”

Asked if Rinne and Saros knew his decision, Laviolette paused for several seconds, sighed and said “yes.”

Saros, 22, had a .923 save percentage in 21 appearances in the regular season.

Though it’d be a far cry from replacing Marc-Andre Fleury with Matt Murray, Saros is viewed as Nashville’s goalie of the future and outplayed Rinne at times, particularly in the month of February.