Real Kyper & Bourne - Habs Top Prospect Ivan Demidov + Vally's View on the Next NHL Record

Episode Date: April 8, 2025

Nick Kypreos and Justin Bourne are joined by Steve Valiquette (4:28), former NHL goaltender, current MSG Networks analyst, and CEO of Clear Sight Analytics to discuss 'The Quiet Eye' technique for athletes and how it can be applied to goaltenders in the NHL, Alex Ovechkin's effectiveness on a one-timer, who is better at scoring goals and the best spots to attack as a left-handed or right-handed shooter and whether Martin Brodeur's win record can be broken. Then, Sportsnet and Pro Hockey Group's Jason Bukala (35:30) stops by to chat about the change in direction by the Montreal Canadiens to sign one of their top prospects Ivan Demidov and the expectations for the KHL winger.The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Sports & Media or any affiliates.

Welcome back to the program. Real Kipper and Bourne show as we go national. We are live on Sportsnet. We're on the Sportsnet 650 in Vancouver, Sportsnet 960 in Calgary. This hour of Real Kipper and Born brought to you by bet 365, Nick Kiprios, Justin Bourne, Disco Daniele. In for the next hour. Yes sir. I just want to open up our national program by dedicating this show to the memory of Greg Millen. We lost All Too Soon yesterday at the age of 67. I

spoke earlier in our program on our Leaf Edition Hour of the time that I spent with Greg Millen. Yeah, people should listen to that. The experience that I had being a Raw rookie in the broadcast world and Greg in many ways taking myself on and Darren Drager as Raw rookies on the desk. That was a really special time. And Greg, of course, had the experience of Hockey Night in Canada, where the bar was set, in terms of what people expected over the years,

bringing us the greatest hockey games in the history of the game. Greg would already been a part of that. And learned a lot out of him over the game. Greg would already been a part of that and learned a lot out of him over the years. You showed up as a scrub and Millen had to turn you into this Paulist professional you are today. And at times I didn't like it. As any of us tough love is essential.

Yeah, never fun. And you know, my experiences with goalies like that didn't stop there. John Garrett, of course, did a tremendous job when we started out as well. You think about the goalie analysts. I don't know if you guys know this, I'm a little older than you guys. But I remember John Davidson, of course, a great New York Ranger goaltender and then John Shannon made a star out of him on Hockey Night in Canada and everyone else followed including Greg Mellon, John Garrett. And then look at

today. Goalies, goalies, goalies. You know, we're gonna have one Steve Valiquette in a few minutes who knocks it out of the park every Tuesday around this time But of course Kelly Rudy's still going strong TSN's got Noodles and Marty Braun. Yeah, buddy. Rick DiPietro has a radio show in the US. Yeah. Yeah. I mean Hank we talk about Lundquist yeah L Yeah long quiz, right? Yeah It's not was coaching. His goalies are everywhere. They they got a different view. That's all I can ever explain it is Why there's so many goalies as analysts they've

You've got a different view and we've we've had great ones over the years, too I mean we've had Carter Hutton on this year Mike McKenna was a regular for us for a while. We've had a good turn out of goalies. They see the game brilliantly. And yeah, you know, everything I have heard from everyone who worked here with Millen was nothing but great guy who, you know, loved to have a laugh and loved his family

and was a respected colleague of many here. So you'll be missed. He will be. In a few minutes, we'll welcome in Steve Valiquette, former NHL Goaltender, MSG Network Analyst, and CEO of ClearSight Analytics. What do you think he has in store for us today? Well, we're gonna learn about,

what is the, damn it, I forget the word now, Kip, the eye thing he sent us today, the quiet eye. The quiet eye, the relaxed eye. The relaxed eye. The quiet eye. And this is, you know, was part of the birth of clear sight analytics, I believe, but we were discussing the, you know, one thing that golfers do about like focusing on a target and one the back of the ball for two to three seconds to let everything sort of set goals. You athletes use this.

He's got a whole book on it. He's got thoughts on it. We're gonna learn a little bit about the quiet eye today. That sounds like a modern piece of technology that some goalie wears and it's like, well, they did. They have fixed it to the helmet of a goalie. And I think that allowed them to see

hence the clear sight, what the goalie was seeing with traffic. Oh, that's so cool. We're gonna ask him. Of course, of course. That's really cool. I'm freestyling up here and the the guys literally waiting in the green room. All right, Valley What the hell does quiet? I mean?

Am I gonna do I have to do the interview like this covering my right eye? Listen, I was telling you guys about this two years ago and it probably hasn't helped your putting because you haven't applied it. We didn't listen. All right, my wife could tell you he tells me a lot of things value. It doesn't all stay explain. All right. So this goes back 10 plus years. Joan Vickers from the University of Calgary, she developed an eye device that would really calculate the gaze of athletes and prove that the highest level performing athletes had the longest gaze. It was a mobile eye tracker and what she did was she worked with basketball players

and she was able to figure out that the ones that had the longest gaze at the back of the rim were the most successful on free throws. Golfers that had the longest gaze at the back of the rim were the most successful on free throws. Golfers that had the longest gaze at the back of the ball, specifically like the curvature of the ball, were the strongest off the tee with their irons and putting. Goalies in the NHL that had the longest gaze through the release before a shot was taken were the most successful at stopping the ones that they saw. were the most successful at stopping the ones that they saw. And that's where I started challenging it and looking at scoring chances in the NHL,

ones where goalies had more than half of a second of clear view versus the ones where they didn't. The ones that they did not have that opportunity were past shots, screen shots, deflected shots, and broken plays. And then after doing 200 games myself, I taught somebody how to score these games and they went on to do 200 games.

And then we were able to have enough data to go, at that time, it was actually to the Toronto Maple Leafs and interview with their group. And it was a very intimidating first meeting, DJ Smith Jim Hiller Mike Babcock Lula Murillo Jacques Lamar Jacques Caron goalie coach from the devil that was my first year there I probably saw you but it's so intimidating yeah so intimidating but it was it was really the birth child of it

is quiet I and from a when you boil hockey down to its simplest form, if you are able to achieve your goaltender half of a second of clear view, and you're also able to make the other guy miserable by not allowing him to have half of a second of clear view, you're going to be successful that is hockey. And if you can figure that part out in your own way, you know, there's no roadmap for every team doing it the same way.

But I'll tell you one thing, guys, from watching the Leafs over the last 10 games, they've had extremely strong shot quality. They're getting seven plus high danger while taking 12 or fewer low danger. The low danger ones, again, are where the goalie has more than half of a second of clear view.

They're not giving those feelers to goalies right now and I like the way they're playing. That's interesting. I just wanted one last thing on the quiet I think. So is that more about the goaltender, like about teaching them to do something differently or is it more about the defenders and teaching them to do something differently? Well it's a great question. You know what, Borny? This wasn't something that was talked about in the locker room or that type of thing from

Benoit, Laird to Henrik and I. But you know what he always preached? Set your feet. Why? Because when you set your feet, you set your eyes. And when you're moving laterally, we would always stay away from coming up in our stance and then coming back down

because then there's a delay of getting back to eyes level. And all of your movement is really on a path where you're tracking your head over your leading knee and you see their best goalies. Think of Carey Price, how smooth he was from side to side. Well, he was able to capture that all-important half of a second just a split second sooner because he was setting his feet and setting his eyes.

Is that what Ovechkin's done 895 times set his feet and his eyes? Well, you know where he's special is we always talk about the release and also the knuckling of the puck. You know, it's not, you're not seeing. And that's the thing too. The one-timer kipper. What does a one-timer do? It doesn't allow a goalie to set their feet and set their eyes.

That's why the one-timer is so popular and why stick technology and east to west passing has changed the game. Because the goalies developed in the early 2000s to such a high level and the skill is really caught up now and the stick technology has helped but the east to west and taking away the goalies ability to see it clean off the release has changed everything and that's why goal scoring is where it is now. You know it's crazy too with Ovi and this is unrelated to goal well it's not unrelated but like that puck he catches for the game winner how many guys can't

or sorry for the the record breaker? How many guys are catching a wrist shot at the top of the circle with full intent to shoot it as soon as they get it? You know like so many guys like I hadn't catch this look around see what's there Maybe I'll shoot it like he he knew seconds before that hit his stick He was gonna take a wrist shot and it's that commitment like he's just all in on the belief the puck can go in a And it's that commitment like he's just all in on the belief the puck can go in a. You know I'd like it goes back to you know early 2000s when I saw him a few times in person you know what it is to Barney there is also the the mental juggernaut for the goalie of the distraction of knowing who's shooting it.

Like I can't I can't explain it it just feels for a split second like you lose your focus. You're looking at the puck, but you notice the stick because his is different and you notice his yellow laces at the time and his look and it sometimes throws you off because for a split second you're on the puck and then it's over shooting it and then it's by you or it just misses the net and you're like, what am I doing? Why don't I just play him straight up? Why do I keep getting distracted by the fact it's him? And some players in the NHL had that. I felt that with Kovalev. I felt that with Kovalchuk. You know, there was certain guys where, and it was always funny too, because

their sticks were different and their tape jobs were different and it was distracting and it was usually the star players. When it's clean on a rink wide pass, are you left, is a goalie left just to be as big as he can and just hope and pray or guess or can you ultimately get there still and cover off every part of the net? Yeah, you know, like Kipper, it's interesting because you know, on the pre scouts that players are in specific spots. I feel like goalies right now in this era. They've done a good job of not allowing positioning to be

the reason why they're scored on because 10 years ago, most of us were over challenging and you couldn't even get across. So 10 out of 10 are going to go in because you just couldn't get there. And even a goalie like Dustin Wolf, as small as he is, comparatively speaking, he plays incredibly deep, you know, and so you can hit those spots just a little sooner. You can get your stops because again, it's I think it's more important to get into the middle of the net and get squareness on the puck versus chasing depth and try to be out of control while you're chasing out

because you can hit the middle of your net sooner by taking a shorter path through the crease. And that's a big piece of this. And you know, it's fascinating. I was looking at handedness today and it was kind of wild looking at all the different handedness of the players in the league and how effective it can be when you're looking at school goal scoring and it started with looking

at Demco last week he gave up a goal where it was five hole and it was from far enough out where you expect him to make a save it was a Kyle Connor shot and it was top of the circles it was pretty clear it was clear sighted he could see it all the way through and you remember me talking about how the puck should be halfway between the shooter and the goaltender where you see a successful save. Well, in this case, it was past that halfway point and it beat him five hole and Kepra.

I was thinking about you because when we were talking about places on the net to shoot right now modern day, you were surprised that it wasn't five hole and I quickly said no, it's you know, it's high glove because you know, but that was really looking at all things lateral movement shots screenshots deflections even rebounds, but when you isolate it and I want to give you credit here because you were right when you isolate it to shots that are clear sighted

Again half of a second of clear view on the puck from the slot from the slot with time and space or odd man rushes So imagine those one-on-one situations in the game where it's really just you see it. It's shooter and goalie The numbers really surprised me the best place to shoot right now in the NHL is five hole on those me the best place to shoot right now in the NHL is five hole on those on those where goalie's got clear view and you're in a shoot to score area. So it was 15. It is 15% this season shooting five hole is better than over the glove over the glove shooting percentage in those situations

is 13% and over the blocker is only nine and a half percent under the blocker 11% under the5%. Under the blocker, 11%. Under the glove, 11%. And you can imagine where I'm going with this. It made me think of, you know, what matters to shooters sometimes is having inside ice. And what matters to goalies sometimes is whether it's a lefty or a righty.

And interesting. Borny, and Kipper, you as well. You guys both lefties? Yeah, I'm a righty. You're a righty, Borny. Okay. First of all, 384 forwards in the NHL any given night. Lefties 3546 shots, 281 goals. Righties, 2080 shots, 184 goals. So I was looking at five whole shots from right-handed shooters, 16%, left-handed shooters, 14%. So you're actually better as a righty.

I thought that over the glove was going to be more for a lefty and it's in fact the same. It's 13% whether you're a lefty or a righty. I thought that under the blocker was going to be a higher shooting percentage for lefties. It's not. Righties have a 13% chance to score under the blocker. Lefties are 10%. Under the glove, I thought it was going to be right-handed shooters, and it is. It's 13%. Better chance to score for a right-handed shooter under the glove than a left-handed shooter at 10%.

So I thought this was all fascinating, and then it went one step further. I don't know why I get into one of these rabbit holes. You're in the rabbit hole. That's why. No, I'm in it. I'm in it. I'm thinking, what else do I need to know why I get into one of these rabbit holes. You're in the rabbit hole. That's why. No, I'm in it. I'm in it. And I'm thinking, what else do I need to know about this? Well, how interesting is it to think that, or imagine, that some goalies have more difficulty with lefties

versus righties on a shot. Like, it's a different. It's eight feet away. That's what I always tell a goalie. When they're lined up and they don't know if it's a lefty or a righty because they haven't scanned first, you can't just track the pass. You want to get ahead of it so you get that half of a second. But a lefty on the ice all the way around to a righty, it's about an eight foot difference.

So Anton Forsberg, just let's guess here and say that the Leafs are playing auto on the first round. Anton Forsberg is the fourth best goalie in the NHL in safe percentage stopping left-handed shooters. Ulmark is fifth best in the NHL in safe percentage at stopping right-handed shooters. Bottom five guys, kind of interesting here, left-handed shooters had top five success against both Jeremy Swainman and Corpus Aulou and they're on the same team. Ilya Samsonov, he was the worst goalie in the NHL against

left handed shooters and this is all minimum 30 shots faced. And I'm wondering to myself, did Boston last year have a lot of lefties in their lineup? Is that what happened? I don't know. Yeah, but you know, there's it's something here and I think it's always interesting when you you know, you nail down certain things and you get into the weeds a little bit the more curious you are, which is why I take in so much hockey content because even when I listen to you guys like there's always something that

peaks my interest that I want to look into a little bit more but when I watch he's better than the lefties Valley when I watch Nate McKinnon on a power play or just kind of like his he ovies at the top of the circle he's at the bottom of the circle and if he gets it cleanly I I think every time he's going high glove against the goalie and he's and I've seen him so many successful Goals on it. You know what it is Kipper? This is something it's kind of wild to me. This hasn't broke through yet because I was in camp with Luongo in 2012 and he was doing

it and I'll give you a situation here. I'll never forget it. He's in net and Crosby comes over the dot line and he gets tight enough in that McKinnon spot the one that you're thinking of. And Crosby goes high glove and Luang goes like this and he gets it with his elbow instead of you know how Stolar has got beat against Florida where it was high glove and he brought his glove around in a circular motion. Like goalies always get caught right here, right?

Now two things. If it's if it's a bomb that gets on top of you right away, or if it's from dots down goalies right now would be much more successful like tracking into shots and using their chicken wing versus using that swinging motion. Sid came around to the back of the line where I was standing in a tracksuit. And he was like, what the F was that? And Luongo, Luongo was funny because we were talking about it before, because that summer he told me that Francois Lair, uh, the other, the other there was coming over the dot line all summer long and training in

Quebec and just having guys shooting high glove and Luongo was using his elbow, his shoulder and his elbow. And, and I said to sit, I was like, so this is something that's coming, man. Guys are going to start taking away the upper part of the net with their shoulders and their elbows. Hellebuck's very successful at it. And I remember one of our previous shows, Borny, where we were talking about how Hellebuck's glove, you know, was one of the stronger gloves in the league. But really what I was referring to was that he covers up top here.

And I remember you saying, yeah, well, what about the Connor McDavid goal for Four Nations, right? Because it was glove side. But in that instance, he kind of got stuck and he didn't go for it because he was deeper in his crease. You can only use the shoulder and the elbow if you're at the right depth. If you're too deep, you do have to be more reactionary. But Connor Hellebuck is very good at protecting the upper part of the net because he does it

in various ways. I don't know that too many guys are doing this very well right now, but the next step for the goalie in the cat and mouse game with the shooter is gonna be protecting better up top with shoulders and elbows from dots down, or if it's a one-timer heater that gets on top you quickly like an OV one or even the Florida one.

I think that was a defenseman that night against Stolarz but you know point is is that there's still another step for goalies to take to catch up to what's going on in the NHL in my opinion. Okay I have a semi real question and a real question. The semi real question is you know my son is eight and he's taping his new stick the other day and he's like, why do they use black or white tape? And I was like, ah, it doesn't matter, use whatever. However, you know, growing up it's all,

oh yeah, black tape, gonna hide the puck at all. Anything to that for a goalie? Black tape make any difference? I believe in that 100% black tape. All right. Because yeah, it just, it hides it enough, you know, and I don't know, you're kind of doing me a favor if you have white tape because I can really see it distinctly off the release. Absolutely.

Now, have you considered that you don't look as cool with black tape? Is that right? I don't know. I don't know. I can use black until I didn't. I decided the style was wonderful. It is, Borny, it is tryout season right now for you guys as well, right?

Yes, they're coming up. Yeah, it is. You know what? I have a message for all the parents because I took a few calls today and this is always out there. Should my son play up? Or should I be looking for another program?

Up by forward or a level? By a level. By a level. and you know what the answer is I've really come to understand this over the last few years if your son or daughter is not dominating where they are keep them where they are if they are dominating move up absolutely it's simple yeah it's not even that complicated I got goalies leaving prep school or going someplace else it's like you haven't even dominated there yet.

What are you talking about? Dominate there. Yeah, you get on the third line of the next level. It's like just score a million goals at the level you're at. Just dominate where you are. You know what? I'm actually heading home this weekend.

I'm gonna go to Richmond Hill, von King's, the banquet. I'm getting inducted into the Hall of Fame of youth hockey. Yeah, congratulations. That's so cool. Huge honor. No, and I'm really looking forward to it because there's some nostalgia there.

You know, you're, and you know what, guys, I remember making AAA for the very first time. It was on my third time because in those days, we had to take all of our small towns, King City, Nobleton, Bolton, Caldoneast, and we all came together and we created the Richmond Hill Vaughan Kings. There might have been 40 goalies at tryouts the first year.

I don't do anything to stand out. To be fair, I wasn't dominating at the single A level anyways for the Bolton Bruins, so what did I need to start for the Richmond Hill Vaughan Kings? And it wasn't until I was the starting goalie for the Bolton Bruins that I went to the Vaughan King tryout and I made it You know and it was time I didn't deserve to be on it the first year or the second year But the third year, you know

I did and and I'll remember this too and I like to kind of tell this story because it's worthwhile for kids to I I'm going into eighth grade and my father has a really severe car accident. He has a 63 Stingray convertible Corvette and it flips over and this is Labor Day weekend going into my eighth grade year at school. And he was in a coma for three weeks and I made promises like you cannot believe prayer and you know I'm going gonna be a good person, I'm gonna do all these things and I'm gonna, and I just wanted my dad to come through.

And it's three weeks that he was in a coma and I'm going to school and the guys at school, my buddies, they don't know what's going on with me. I wasn't comfortable talking about it. I was embarrassed for whatever reason. Fast forward to the end of the season, my dad comes to the Richmond Hill Von King's tryouts in a wheelchair because he's still rehabilitating

and learning how to walk again. And it was one thing that he said to me, he said, because at this time the doctors were saying, you're not gonna walk again, you're not gonna work again. And he was an electrician, owned an electrical company. And he told me this before the tryouts, that if you make this team this year, I'm gonna walk again and I'm gonna work again. owned an electrical company. And he told me this before the tryouts, that if you make this team this year,

I'm going to walk again and I'm going to work again. And I went out there, guys, like my hair was on fire. I'd never worked so hard in my life. I ended up making a team because I made them keep me. Most of it was for my dad, but I remember coming away from that experience and saying to myself, you know what, I'm never going to go back and be the other guy.

It's more fun being the hard worker. And for the kids right now that are listening to this, because I do tell this story to my goalies, there's a point of ignition in everybody's life where you mature up or you realize something powerful. And for me personally, I think the best thing that I ever did was have that adversity at that age because I realized I always wanted to be the hardest working guy after that. For me personally, I think the best thing that I ever did was have that adversity at that age because

I realized I always wanted to be the hardest working guy after that and that was the path to most of us ever getting a chance to play pro. Yeah, that's that's awesome. I have I have your story but mine didn't involve hockey it was uh, Don Valley junior high basketball and I got I got kind of pushed into a tryout that I said, my game's hockey, I love hockey, I'm not doing basketball. All my buds said, no, come and try out for the basketball team. And I'm like, no, I'm not even that good. And I go through three days of tryouts.

The list is up, my name's on it. And I'm like, I'm dumbfounded. And I go up to the head coach, Mr. McCarthy, and I'm like, okay, I don't get it. Why am I on this team? He goes, you were the hardest working guy. They couldn't get the ball off you underneath the rim. And I'm like, that was my wow moment.

So that was my, okay, so- You took that to hockey? If I, yeah, exactly. If. So if that's a hockey if I exactly if I can do that for a sport, I'm not even sure I really like what could I do in the game that I love if I apply myself like I just did in basketball, right and that was my moment of hard work really can get you somewhere. You know, and you know what?

You know, I remember Jeff O'Neill recognizing it and he was a couple years older than me. My coach was Paul Buchabum in Richmond Hill, Jeff Buchabum's cousin. And they used to bring me out and Jeff was really cool where he'd shoot on me, spend extra time, the puck would go to the other end, he'd come down and do breakaways on me.

But he was always really cool that way with me because I think we had a mutual respect for just, you know, I want to shoot on a goalie that digs in, right? And, you know, funny that I even say that because Jeff O'Neill was actually with me at my OHL draft. And by the time I played my first game, I remember playing against Caroline, he skated by and he goes, hey, Valley, what took you so long to get here? Just say we're not as gifted as you dog.

But it's funny that started with the Richmond Hill, Von Kings. As funny as that goes, you know, that's funny. You know, you know, I hate to turn the page on that because it's a great theme. We could talk about it for a long time. But I you know, before we got talking about that that You were talking about this is coming for goaltending You know taking away the top part of the net chicken wing this sort of stuff You know the way the goaltending evolved for a while was We are going to be where basically challenged the shooters and say we're gonna take away

93% of the net and if you can hit the seven Congratulations, and guess what you can hit the seven, congratulations. And guess what? We can hit the seven now. And so now goaltenders are sort of having to evolve. And I wonder if that won't give rise or give a return to athletic goaltending to where it has to be more reactionary. You can't just play the percentages because we can hit the percentage now. Yeah, I agree with that all the way. It's already happening. I know that I bought into this a few years ago.

I think I told you guys this story once where when I retired, Borny, I didn't know what I didn't know. I really didn't. I was asking a lot of questions. For instance, I didn't know that the quickest way for me to get my low blocker down to make a save would be if I drive both my knees down

harder to the ice and pitch forward. I actually wasn't sure. I wasn't sure if my knee should stay off a little bit because I'd get more, I guess, range. And I really had these questions and I was asking and I didn't like a lot of the answers I received until I received a call from a biomechanics coach and it was it was actually through Jim Hiller because I went to a summer camp with him and was

talking to him a bunch of stuff that I was getting into and he invited me to go out and job shadow him out at Tri-Cities because that's where he was coaching the WHL and long story short I got a call from this guy. I'm driving over the Tappan Zee Bridge. I know where I am at this point, and I'll never forget this moment. But he said to me, what are troubling you? You know, what thoughts and stuff? I said, look, I don't know about the upper glove, the low blocker. He said, OK, we'll start with the high glove.

If the shot's coming from dots down, how would you save it? And I was like, well, I'm gonna bring my arm up like this, the way I was saying about earlier, the Stolar's example. And he said, well, let's talk about using your shoulder and elbow, but you have to make sure that your posture is proper. And I talk a lot about posture here, and this is a really good example because he said,

and imagine that I'm driving in my truck at this moment, he said, you're sitting in your seat with your back up against your seat, and you're looking at the road ahead of you. He said, take your arm and try and touch the roof of your car with your elbow. And well, you see, like, I get stuck here because I'm sitting back. And I said, well, I can't. He said, exactly. But now pitch your chest forward, look down the hood of your car as if you could see the road coming underneath your vehicle,

and now do it. And when you do that, you can get all this range, right? And the key is, is that on the shots that are coming at your ear from face-off dots down from most goalies because of size, etc., you have to keep your head silent off the release on just those two shots, the ones are coming at your ear whether it's left or right and you can get that range. If the shot is further out, then really what you're doing with your glove is you're just going north and you see a lot of goalies going here with their fingers up. Now that works because you have more reactionary time from that distance. But I think in the future, more goalies are gonna start bringing this in. And again, Luongo was the best I saw do it. And then there really hasn't been anybody that's been consistently great since,

which is why we still see a lot of goals in the upper part of the net, because guys are caught between shoulder and elbow and trying to get a catch. But in most cases, that catch is rounded rather than fingers up and just going into attacking space. So I think we're running out of time.

I wanted to ask you with Marc-Andre Fleury retiring this season at 573 wins, is the true unbreakable record, which we thought many years ago was Wayne Gretzky's goal scoring, is now belong to Marty Brodeur at 691. Like, no one's touching that. You know what, this is a good one, Kipper, because here's a few things. Brodeur played 11 NHL years without shootouts,

right? So you have to imagine that he missed a lot of wins there without shootouts. And now we've got three on three. Oh, yeah. So there's going to be the next wave of guys that come in that have that. So they're going to get a lot of extra wins there. Brodeur also played through a full season stoppage as well as

two shortened stoppages. Maybe we don't. So he lost basically two years right there. He was incredibly durable. That was always his thing and we've you know, another thing I looked at was we've played 19 years since the 0405 lockout and only two goalies have played over 60 games and won the Stanley Cup in that time and it's Jonathan Quick in 12 and it's Marc Andre

Fleury in 2009 and so if we could say that the last 12 winners played fewer than 60 games and in six cases we saw the Stanley Cup winners over the last 19 years use two goalie tandems I think that the reasoning at least analytically and you know just for the coaching staff they don't want to play their guys 60 plus games. So you're going to see fewer goalies have the opportunity to get a lot of wins because they're not going to overplay them. As we saw, check out how many games Broder played during his career. He had how many seasons of 70 plus games, 60 plus games. I don't think we're going to see that again. So even Marc Andre Fleur

right now, he's 118 wins away from beating it. Um, he's a former first overall pick and he played games at 18 years old in the NHL and he's 40 right now. So who else is going to play for that length of time and be durable as he has. And he's, he's played for good teams, but in the future, I don't think guys like Mark Andre Fleury are going to see the games that Brodeur saw. Marc-Andre Fleury would have to play for four more years

at what, 30 wins. And you know what else, too? On top of all that, I think that most guys, most guys at certain points in their career are always tempted to go to Europe as well. That really wasn't a thing in Broder's era. But I mean, I'm going to say no, because I think that everybody, games played wise, is always going to be on a restriction that he wasn't back in the day. Awesome stuff, man. Valley, great storytelling. Really appreciate it as always on our Tuesdays. Another fantastic job.

Thanks for doing this. All right boys be good. Take care Thanks. I appreciate it. Alla cat former NHL Doing a great job with his Clear site analytics. Yes, sir. All right before we get to Books, you should do game. What's called game time game time game time. I love game time. I just had a Small brain moment. All right, here we go, gentlemen. It's game time presented by Bet365. Visit the app for the latest odds and find out why it's never ordinary at Bet365. Must be 19 plus. Ontario only play responsibly. 10 games in the NHL tonight. I want to hone in on one in particular involving the

Ottawa Senators on the road in Columbus. Ottawa can clinch a playoff spot tonight for the first time since 2017. All they need to do is beat the Columbus Blue Jackets. For the third time in like three weeks. To that I say, give me the Ottawa Senators on the road. They're minus 120 on the money line. Frankly, I'm surprised they're not even bigger favorites. Minus 120 on the money line.

If you wanted to lay even extra juice, plus on the spread minus one and a half Ottawa senators Booking their ticket to the Stanley Cup playoffs. Yeah, I mean Columbus been a wonderful story this season, but well placed money there Yeah, all right. That's a game time presented by bet Three six five is it the app for the latest odds and find out why it's never ordinary at Bet365. Must be 19 plus, Ontario only, play responsibly. Okay, let's get to a break so we can get back to our in-studio guest. We're gonna get Jason Buchla,

does a terrific job with the draft, junior hockey, and the topic of discussion will be the Montreal Canadiens in a surprise move move getting their top prospect in the lineup and could be eligible to play in the Stanley Cup playoffs. We'll tell you who when we return to Real Kipper and Barker. Be sure to subscribe and download the show on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. As a reminder, this hour of Real Cipper and Born brought to you by Bet365, Nick Kiprios, Justin Bourne. Let's welcome in Jason Bucola as... Bucs.

Thanks for joining us. I know you guys are getting set for your 6.30 show on Hockey Central. A big topic of discussion has to be Ivan Demidov. Get used to saying that one. We weren't expecting him to leave the KHL and join the Montreal Canadiens this season. Is that correct, Jason? That is absolutely 100% correct. So what happened?

Well, story time, just a little bit. Okay, yeah, yeah, that's why you're here. Is that correct? That is absolutely 100% correct. So what happened? Well Story time just a little bit. Okay. Yeah, that's why you're anybody. So world juniors I had dinner with Nick Bobrov who's the scouting director one of the co-scouting director with the Habs Okay, Nick goes way back to He's got Russian descent his dad's a member of the management team at Scott and Nick was formerly part of Scott as well. Okay. So they did a lot of homework clearly before they even made that selection last year at number five. They knew what they were getting into. But I got the impression after that I kind of went down a few rabbit holes about it trying to you know poke the bear a bit and that's delicate as you all know with the Russian kids.

You don't want to you know want to push the I want to stay in my lane basically what I'm trying to say. Anyways, wow did this this knock up on me because as of a couple weeks ago when Scott was making playoffs this kid For a little perspective for everybody 19 years old He's the first 19 year old in the history of the KHL to lead a team in scoring Wow, and it's Scott which is like the Montreal Canadiens in that way. It's a big money team So I'll give you that first. A couple names behind them. Kaprizov, Grigorenko, Kuznetsov, these types of players, right? So this snuck up on me that they went from maybe not playing him in playoffs because the Russian way is that we're gonna punish our players

and they knew he was leaving at the end of the year so they were you know we're not gonna play in playoffs. Of course they did and then he led the team in scoring and playoffs they got eliminated in six games to Dynamo but here we go this is this is a great story in terms of a handful of games to go and how do you slot him in typically you would be very guarded under any circumstance from any rookie from 19 to 23 maybe coming out of the NCAA. Like, how did the Montreal Canadiens approach this? Is this guy going to walk in and play 18, 20 minutes?

I would say that if they beat the Detroit Red Wings tonight, that the strategy changes a little bit. Right out of the box, guys,'s he's gonna play free offensively Okay, he's not gonna. He's not gonna be buckled up. He sees the full width He plays he's a left shot, but he plays the right wing so on zone exits when you're playing your off wing Everything's in front of you. Yeah, you know what I mean? You're not and so everything's in front of him and he he's either darting or he's making plays right away. He's super comfortable He's not gonna have any problem with that whatsoever

Defensively he's there's gonna be some times where you know when a switch happens if you're man-on-man and the switch happens down low off Of coverage where he's gonna have to rotate up top He's gonna might get caught flat foot a little bit So my answer to the question is if they beat Detroit tonight feel more comfortable about it get him over here get him acclimated Get him on the time zone and And go from there. But he's going to play. He's going to be really good. We've both come in many nights or days and we've looked at our phones and go, did you

see this? Oh yeah. He is a human highlight reel. He's more than any other prospect I can remember being like dude. Did you see that that one or this one? It's he's it's sick. You need it's it's very unique I don't want to hyperbole it But I have to tell you guys how it feels in the pit of my stomach and as you know I've tracked this kid for a couple years, right?

So even today when I had all this news coming through I texted some people in the Habs organization just because I wanted to be sure because I've seen this before right with you So I just want to be sure this kids on a plane or whatever and I got the thumbs up That was great So then I reached out to a couple of my colleagues in Russia that I've worked with in the past I said honestly like am I hyper boiling this how good is this kid? Give me a comparison and the one guy came back today says better than Kapri Sov at the same age Already 50% better than Mitch Goff last year

Yeah, all right, so they like the whole lot so, you know, we've all met Russians, right? Yeah, like they're pretty buckled up Yeah, so what blows okay, so What I'm torn about with this is two things one One, look at Lane Hudson and how exceptional he's been this year, gonna win the Calder Trophy. But if you asked Montreal Canadiens fans about him two months into the season, they'd be like, he's gotta find the D-zone still. You know, and he has, and that's come around now,

he's defending well, but it takes some time. So heading into playoffs, is there some risk of saying, yeah, this guy's free flowing and he sees the ice But it's even the best in the world takes some time to get that defensive aspect so how comfortable should the Canadians be with him in playoffs and To that should they even care since they don't expect this to be a cup year. This is all kind of gravy Yeah, I think you have to be strategic I will say this that I think he's got enough metal that when he makes a mistake, so Roman

Rottenberg, who's a coach there for him at Scott, there was nights this kid only played six minutes and then there was other nights that there was a playoff game. He played 28 minutes. So what I'm trying to tell you is that like his makeup mentally, there's no, there's no high, not too high, not too low. I'm not too high not too low I'm gonna stay in the game no matter what the situation presents, so You know does he make your power play better absolutely does he do you get a positive line matchup on home ice? Maybe it's not a defensive zone draw to switch off a one draw

You know stuff like that run a set play out of it all these things But defensively yeah, he's gonna be challenged. absolutely. Well, but now you talk about Lane Hudson. It's it's harder in when I work for Dale Town and we were drafted to fast when he always just the same way I say honestly, a defenseman until he's played 250 games in the NHL 250 games in the NHL. You don't know that he's at his peak performance. You don't know exactly what you're getting until he gets that deep. That's Dale's, you know, anymore. These kids are arriving sooner, getting paid sooner,

so they better get it figured out a lot sooner than that. But there's a little bit more freedom on the wing defensively. You've been part of an NHL scouting staff. You've been part of a management team. Where would the pitfalls be outside of this guy just maybe Not being able to make the adjustments just yet this soon Would it be messing with the chemistry at this point with the Montreal Canadiens like at the end of the day

I've been on enough teams and rosters where when we see a new guy coming in over trade or in this instance, it's like whose spot is he taking? Whose minutes is he taking? Who's coming off the ice for this guy to come on? Where do you see him fitting in? Is he, is he, you got Suzuki, Slavkovski and Caulfield. You ain't touching that. New Hook is with Patrick Lyonet.. Like where where do you see the fit coming in? Yeah, he he has to play amongst those names that you just mentioned right there Maybe the vorac gives him a little protection there defensively, you know The work's been playing better lately in his last five games I think he's got two tucks and he's he's tracking and he's winning a lot of his draws

So there's like some those little little built in positives that might might actually springboard him to a little bit more as well. But I am totally on board how you just position that, because when you are you got guys blocking shots with their face, they're pushing everything they got. They're bleeding themselves dry every night to get you into playoffs. And now you introduce somebody, somebody new, you better be comfortable with your leadership group in the room, that they can insulate whatever that is. And I think that starts with the coach. I think he's created a great culture there. Actually, upper management

has done a hell of a job. Let's be honest, like this is this is pretty fantastic what they've done in relatively short order. But yeah,'s it's not perfect it's not perfect but it's part of the process. There you go turn the page on this one just so before we run out of time Zane Parek is also gonna be in the NHL now tell us a little bit about what's going on there in this kid. So Zane Parek became only the second defenseman in OHL history maybe CHL I'd have to double check on that OHL history to have more than 30 goals and back-to-back years the other guy was this young guy from Perry Sound named Bobby Orr pretty good I heard. So Zayn Parak is I call him an

offenseman. He had 107 points. He's like I call him an offenseman, which isn't a word so nobody look it up, but he's he's like a fourth forward he's like he's a rover almost a little bit and Now having said that his defensive commitment went to a new level for me and all I need for him to be guys is average Defensively, I know that he's not gonna be superior in that but all the rest of it is so elite You can't teach that you can't even all you can do is nurture that Evan Bouchard ish no oh my god way more compete defensively than Bouchard way more well that's a healthy start and six foot and he's six foot 185 compared to bush who's what six to 208 whatever he is more engaged more his person he's got this huge personality.

So he's in it, you know, and he'll block shots. He didn't really penalty kill very much to Saginaw and he definitely will do it in the NHL. When he gets the puck, I'll tell you. Like remember, did you play Brian Leach in the, remember when Brian Leach would get a puck and he'd hit it up ice and it's just like it's just beautiful thing to watch You know like the Quinn Hughes now these types of guys his name preks like that. He's a right shot. Yeah, it's highly coveted and Calgary hasn't disappeared yet here. They're also in a position here where you've big next game. Yeah big next game, but

Not only you want to get you don't think he gets in a game So just bringing him in the environment and experiencing being around the big leagues I don't think he gets in a game. You don't think he gets in a game? No. So just bringing him in the environment and experiencing being around the big leagues. I think he gets in a game. This is what it's about. If they lose to Anaheim. And obviously they got Anaheim then Mini. Is that what it is?

Correct. Yep. And watching Anaheim last night, like that's a tough out. Yeah. They're a funny team. They're a funny team to watch. Oh my God. The most miserable bench coaching staff I've ever seen in my life.

They just look miserable all the time. That's not having a lot of fun. No. Anyways, I digress. I think obviously that one's a little bit different. And to your point with Lane Hudson, this is a defenseman coming in at this time of year, which I think is a whole different thing. Like, would you bring a goalie in from college and throw him in a playoff race?

No, there's not going to be that going on. One of my favorite pieces of recent analysis I heard was Colby Armstrong saying that playing wing, well, I didn't like that he said it's harder than playing center, but as D get better, I think in the D zone, it's becoming harder for a winger to defend, right? Because some of these guys, Parekh and Hudson and Hughes and McCarr and all of a sudden playing wing and you're doing switches and you're chasing around these guys, I think it's going to get a lot harder. It's the lateral movement that's gone to another level.

They used to stand there. I don't know left or right. I remember my junior coach saying, you can stand there and just touch your D-man with your stick and kind of know you got him. They didn't go anywhere. They didn't go anywhere. Yeah. Which is interesting that you say that because that to me, when I hear coaches say, I want

a lefty, I want a righty, with all the switching and everything that goes on the only thing I can think of I guess on zone exits but the other thing is like that you know when you're turning to defend against the rest when we have McKenzie we hear real quick he came up as a right right D okay then we had to transition to the left side right you guys know from body mechanics you know you train yourself it's like turn pivot chased it over my right shoulder from a right shot your body gets used to that all the time he had to train himself to do it on the other side But he's athletic enough to do it

These guys on the blue line now, they're so I you watch a lot of teams like their wingers They'll give you the puck back to the point They just won't just keep him in front of me. They're there they're Within ten feet. There's five guys within ten feet of each other. Yeah Within ten feet there's five guys within ten feet of each other. Yeah Below the hash marks and if you want to go up D to D, that's all that's okay I'm just not getting beat up there, right? We'll give you that one because I can at least get in the lane Yeah, right. If you stay tight to a guy, I'll jump by and see you later

Oh, yeah And then when they work the high low cycle and you're too tight like that You're just gonna get picked out of the way. So when you come to the middle like that, you'll give them that perimeter Oh, yeah, you know, you'll you'll you'll no problem. picked out of the way so when you come to the middle like that you'll give them that perimeter oh yeah you know you'll you'll no problem stay out there all day long yeah well this is exciting yeah I think Montreal Canadian fans have a lot I got to look forward to for the Habs you guys know I've been this kid better not fall flat on his face because I'm gonna I got a lot of stock invested in this you have not been too wrong

No, here we go. We got demidov highlights now. This is great. Yeah, they're what a pass Yeah, we're just gonna sit here do Through everybody and he's not striding he's just actually cutting his edges I don't super strong guys like he's his core and it's sturdiness along the wall He extended place for a lot of those veteran guys on Scott So he's gonna be a dog on a bone as well, which is nice because you know how to score You gotta have to do all those little things I haven't been this excited about a year from here player since we drafted Alexander Barkov, and I don't say that lately I I had this barkov end up doing?

It's going okay. It's going okay. Barky's a center man. But in terms of pure skill and upside, I think Kaprizov and all that, wow, Montreal, they're going in a really positive direction. Awesome. Okay, you guys have a great show. For those of you who do not change that channel, Cross Sportsnet, these guys are up in about

a half an hour. See you then. Our thanks to Jeff Chickren in the first hour, former NHL defenseman, covering the Florida Panthers, and then Steve Alliquette. Enjoy your games tonight, and we're back to do it all over again on the Real Kipper and Bortran show. Have a great night, everybody.