Predators coach mum on Rinne’s status for Game 3
Even the most enhanced interrogation techniques would be no match for Nashville Predators coach Peter Laviolette.
Reporters pressed him Wednesday for a definitive answer on the status of goaltender Pekka Rinne, whom he yanked from the Predators’ Game 2 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins in the Stanley Cup Final.
Would Laviolette return to Rinne, who has a .778 save percentage in two games and is winless in nine starts (0-7-2) against the Penguins, in Game 3 on Saturday?
“Pekka’s been excellent for us all year long,” Laviolette said. “There’s things that we could’ve done. All three goals in the third period were odd-man rushes.” Well, it was worth a try. Laviolette is known to be secretive in regards to his lineup, so his tight-lipped response was predictable. But his non-answer will fuel speculation in the lead-up to Saturday’s game at Bridgestone Arena.
Although Rinne’s goals-against average and save percentage have worsened in each playoff series this spring, the Predators’ faith in him is unshakable.
A switch at the position is unlikely, but Laviolette does have a history of volatile decision-making regarding his goaltenders in the playoffs.
In 2006, Laviolette, then with the Carolina Hurricanes, benched veteran Martin Gerber for rookie Cam Ward. The move paid off — Ward earned the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP and the Hurricanes won the Stanley Cup.
As coach of the Philadelphia Flyers five years later, Laviolette started three goaltenders during a 2011 Eastern Conference quarter- final series against the Buffalo Sabres. He made seven in-game goalie changes in 11 playoff games that season, though one was injury-related.
“You started looking over your shoulder wondering if you’re going to be out,” said former Flyers goaltender Brian Boucher, one of the three starters in that firstround series. “It was an uneasy situation.”
NHL teams that lose the first two games of a best-of-seven Stanley Cup Final have an all-time series record of 5-45. Nashville is competing for a championship because of Rinne, who is 7-1 with a 1.54 goals-against average and .947 save percentage at Bridgestone Arena this postseason.
Whether Rinne continues to falter or rebounds, he will be the deciding factor in this series.
“I think he’s been trying to force it a little bit too much as opposed to letting the game come to him,” said Boucher, now an NBC analyst. “I think he needs to relax, trust that he’s a good goaltender, regroup and have himself a game in Game 3.”