DUCKS KEEP KINGS AND THEIR GOALIES GUESSING
Ducks’ dilemma: Team calls up hot Gibson from AHL as Boudreau seeks options in net
TLOS ANGELES he Anaheim Ducks took the day off Friday to rest up and wait for the goalie to arrive who wasn’t officially coming, but actually was.
In fact, as we write this, John Gibson is probably finding out from Ducks’ coach Bruce Boudreau whether or not, after getting off the flight from Norfolk, Va., where he’s been lighting it up in the nets for Anaheim’s farm team, he’s going to be starting in goal in a pivotal Game 4 against the Los Angeles Kings tonight at the Staples Center.
The forecast is “unlikely,” but gusting to “with Boudreau, you never know.”
He has done it before, benching Jose Theodore and starting rookie Semyon Varlamov in Game 2 of the Washington Capitals’ playoff series against the New York Rangers, which the Caps rallied to win in seven.
He has already started a rookie, Frederik Andersen, over veteran Jonas Hiller for most of these playoffs, though Hiller played the first two games against the Kings, both losses, and came off the bench for the third time in the post- season Thursday when Andersen appeared to wrench his knee in the third period of the Ducks’ 3- 2 series- salvaging win.
And now, Boudreau has a tantalizing/ dangerous decision to make, once more.
Gibson has played more minutes than any goalie in the American Hockey League playoffs, and has a 1.45 goalsagainst average and a .955 save percentage. His team beat the Kings’ farm club in the first round of Calder Cup playoffs despite the losing goalie, Jean- Francois Berube, posting a 1.67 GAA and .936 save percentage.
The 20- year- old is basically too good to be playing in the AHL, and is so hot right now, the temptation to start him must be excruciating for Boudreau, whose track record late in the season telegraphed his feelings about Hiller, who is expected to be dealt or let go in the off- season.
There is also this: faced with the Ducks’ biggest game of the regular season, with the division pennant potentially on the line against San Jose in the final week, whom did Boudreau pick to play the net? John Gibson.
If the Ducks really had faith in Hiller, GM Bob Murray wouldn’t have tried to move heaven and earth to sign Buffalo’s Ryan Miller last summer for a team that already had Andersen, and the presumptive goalie of the future in Gibson cooling his heels on the farm.
This certainly isn’t about current form. Hiller has been fine. He got the win coming off the bench Thursday, and can hardly be faulted for the first two games, both essentially 2- 1 losses.
It’s just … what if Gibson could be Ken Dryden, vintage 1971? What if he could help the Ducks steal this series that the Kings were so close to nailing down Thursday night, and take them to the conference final? Boudreau was being coy. “I have no idea. I didn’t even know he was coming up. Is he?” said the coach.
If he were called up, though …
“He’s always an option, if he’s called up.”
When would he make up his mind?
“Well, I’ll have to know before the evening is out, because I want the goalies to know the night before, I don’t like shocking them first thing in the morning,” Boudreau said.
Officially, the Ducks weren’t even ruling Andersen out. They listed the 24- year- old Dane as questionable — like forwards Matt Beleskey and Mathieu Perreault — with lower- body injuries. But Gibson’s call- up suggests they think the injury to Andersen is serious enough to extract their farm club’s No. 1 player from the Norfolk roster in mid- playoffs.
Someone asked Boudreau before the series if he minded that the Kings were absolutely set in goal with Jonathan Quick, while the Ducks appeared to be up in the air.
Boudreau objected to the characterization, and with good reason. “Up in the air” is Minnesota, with Darcy Kuemper hurt and Ilya Bryzgalov playing.
The Ducks have, or had, so many options, none of them bad, that there was hardly any way to guess wrong.
“We’ve had four elite NHL goalies play for us this season,” said defenceman Ben Lovejoy, the winning- goal hero of Game 3. “We traded Viktor ( Fasth) away ( to Edmonton) because there just wasn’t enough room. I think everybody has confidence in any of the three goalies that could go ( tonight).”
Both the Kings and the Ducks have great depth up and down the roster, both have been good at limiting chances, and both have had chances to win each of the first three games.
So the notion that a goalie change at this point is what the Ducks need doesn’t pass the sniff test. It could easily be a classic case of misdirection.
Then again, no one saw it coming when Boudreau started Andersen in Game 3, after Hiller was the first goalie off the ice at the morning skate, usually a dead giveaway.
“I called ( Ducks’ goalie coach) Dwayne Roloson ‘ The Chemist’ on the ice yesterday because he was trying to concoct plans of which goalie was going off first. We all knew who was playing last night,” said Lovejoy.
One time, a few years back, the Ducks were so devious, J. S. Giguere and Bryzgalov met at centre ice after the morning skate, and moved off the ice arm- in- arm, edging through the gate to the players’ bench sideways.
“I think very little of that stuff actually works,” Lovejoy said. “Often times, I think we are all way overthinking things, but I guess it’s fun. It worked last night … and then we ended up using both goalies.”
One worry about potentially starting Gibson is that Boudreau would almost certainly “lose” Hiller, by benching him for a second rookie in the same playoff season.
“I worry about that all the time, with any player, but these players are all playing for something other than the coach and the Stanley Cup, sometimes — they’re playing for their jobs,” said the coach. “In a year’s time, it’s not anybody but yourself that’s going to be the worse for it, so it’s in the best interests for everybody to stay involved.’’
He admitted he was even concerned about Hiller when he told him Andersen was starting on Thursday.
“When you tell a goalie he’s not going in, you don’t know what the mindset is on the bench,” he said, “but he’s been great the three times he’s had to come in from the bench. So Hilly, I have no problem with him.”
The only problem he has is this sore temptation. Chances are, he will resist it. But with Bruce Boudreau, you never know.