The Hockey PDOcast - Goalies In Round 2, The Opponents They're Going Up Against, and Their Biggest Challenges

Episode Date: May 7, 2026

Dimitri Filipovic is joined by Kevin Woodley to break down what we're seeing from the goalies still playing in Round 2, the opponents they're facing in their current matchups, and the biggest challenges in front of them. If you'd like to gain access to the two extra shows we're doing each week this season, you can subscribe to our Patreon page here: www.patreon.com/thehockeypdocast/membership If you'd like to participate in the conversation and join the community we're building over on Discord, you can do so by signing up for the Hockey PDOcast's server here: https://discord.gg/a2QGRpJc84 The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.

dressing to the mean since 2015. It's the Hockey PEDEOCast with your host, Dmitri Filippovich. Welcome to the HockeyPedioCast. My name's Demetri Filippovich. And joining me is my good buddy, Kevin Woodley. Kevin, what's going on, man? We recovered from the opening game of the Colorado, Minnesota series. It is indeed hard to watch hockey from the fetal position.

But I pulled it off. Didn't pull anything back. It's okay. We're all right. We survived. Yeah, that was a tough one for the goalie union, I imagine. What, 14 combined?

goals against for the two goalies, not counting the empty netter, and the coaches afterwards tried to defend them as much as they could. Maybe we're quick to point out that the rest of the series would not look that way, and I did think, uh, you know, I had Harmon on yesterday and we did a Patreon show talking about this, but I did think they accomplished that mission. Like it was, especially a five-on-five, much fewer risks being taken, odd man rushes against more manageable situations, didn't necessarily go as well for Philip Gustafin in the wild as I think they were hoping after making.

making that switch, but still overall, I thought it was an entirely different game environment. Yeah, I know. The coaches defending the goalies post game after game one might have been the only defending that was going on in that one. So it actually wasn't that bad, but, um, hey, man, like you give elite players time and space and look what happens. Give them a pre-scout too and let them really sink their teeth into it because it's the same team for potentially seven straight games versus, you know, Nashville on a Tuesday, Columbus on a Thursday. Where, what city am I in? I don't pay attention. to it like they're going to pay attention to those details and I thought you know cadre talked about it after game one um tendencies and and where they were shooting and things like that it's

it's a fascinating chess match and I imagine we see waltzed back in there for game three everything I know of the young man and his personality and the swagger that he comes with says that he will be ready for that like he will be back up to the form we saw in the first round you know what the most amazing thing about that demetri was he stays in for all eight and by clear side analytics numbers was still above expected for the playoffs after game one.

I thought you were going to say it for the game. I was like, that seems a bit aggressive, but also I believe it. I think it was, it was well over five. I don't know if it was quite five and a half, but it was between five and five and a half of goal,

not having it in front of me, but I looked it up the next morning. And it was between five and five and a half goals. Actually his performance relative to environment was actually slightly better in Scott Wedgwood's in the game one. Well, the thing is as well, and this is going to be kind of an impossible thing to put a number to, which is why we need to apply some of this context,

and we watch the games. Even the Sam Malinski shot, for example, from game one that he scores on to open the scoring, is a good look because they're coming downhill. Nature sends it cross-ice, so there's a bit of movement as well, and then Malinski's coming downhill from the circle, essentially. So it registers as a quality chance regardless,

but he absolutely wired. there's that one and picks his spot up high just under the bar. You could say the same thing. Macar shot. Even the Jack Jury run from in tight after the turnover as well because it's this broken play where there's a quick change of possession. And then he beautifully lifts it as well. And so when the shooters are making their shots like that, ultimately.

Cadre on the breakaway, like it's barring in, right? I mean, sometimes you just have to, as hard as it is to do when you're wearing a goalie mask, tip your cap. All right. We're not going to be apologists, I promise. for the entirety of the show, although I think you needed to hit your quota there just so you don't get your member of the Gully Union card revoked quite yet.

I'm excited to have you on, you know, a couple reasons for that one. You absolutely rock. And I've told you this many times before the listeners agree. Every time you come on, it's always a great time. Makes my job easy as well because I feel like I can just set you up.

And then you just bring us home and I let you cook and you'll just go off on whatever topic I present. for you. So that's great. But also, I want to make sure I have you on at least once every round of the postseason because with the new series, as you mentioned earlier, the dynamics of goalies versus the different offenses they're going to be facing how that all plays out. I want to break that down and examine it with you. And let's start with Wild abs then. You know, the Wild made that decision to make the switch in net heading into game two after Wallsted gave up eight goals against in game one, despite the fact that it largely wasn't his

fault not only because of the quality of the shots, but the quantity of them as well, where they gave up 40 plus shots and to generally Colorado's best shooters from dangerous areas, which is a recipe for failure. What did you think of that at the time? Obviously, now we know the result and it didn't necessarily go that well. For Gustafson, they wind up losing game two anyways or heading back home now. What do you think of the decision to do so? Did you view it purely as not even a results thing after game one, just kind of like a bit of a reset?

because I can't imagine Walsheds start this many games in this close succession very often to begin with. And so it gives them a chance now heading back home to maybe after a handful of days off. And they have an extended break between games two and three as well, which I think will help, maybe hope that kind of changes the dynamic in this series or what did you make of that decision by John Hines in the wild? I didn't mind it. I'm not going to second guess it because it didn't go well. At the end of the day, I think you touched on a lot of the key. points behind a decision like that in terms of, you know, what they're seeing in his game.

Are they seeing any signs of fatigue? The goalie coach there, Freddie Shabat is one of the, like, just like exceptional human being and an even better goalie coach. And so he will have the pulse of his guys. And if he feels like you're going to get the best Yesper Walsat in game three, if you don't play him in game two, then. and that becomes part of the decision, then, you know, again, I have a little problem with it.

I do wonder a little bit whether, you know, for a couple of goalies that were largely, you know, a tandem, I don't think anybody ever ran for extended stretches. You're right, having not done it before, especially for Walshatt at this level under this amount of pressure and this intensity and at altitude for the first two games in Colorado. You know, if your thought process,

is we're going to need Gustafson at some point. I don't think they'd be like, why not now? But like the longer you wait, the harder it is. So maybe there's a combination of the two a little bit. Maybe we can catch lightning in a bottle. Philip Gustafin's been an exceptional goal tender for like four years now. And maybe we get him back and we have a team that should be focused defensively after what happened in game one.

Maybe this is the perfect circumstance to A, get him back in B, make sure that if we go back to ESPR in game three, get the best version. And so some combination of those opinions, I know it's easy to second guess after the fact, but to be honest with you, I didn't mind it at the time. And I'm not going to say I mind it now. Well, this is going to be big time revisionist history on my end. And it's largely because these playoffs, especially going from round one to round two with, you know, round two starting for hurricanes, flyers, and then round one still going on with the game seven on Sunday. Didn't have a lot of time to actually kind of think about this. But now that we're having this

conversation. I do under whether the play would have been to just start Gustafson, for example, in game one. And I know that's a kind of a crazy thing to say after how well, Walsst, they played against Dallas and winning that series in six. But it makes me think of, ironically, was it the 2021 postseason, I think, where the Vegas Golden Knights play the seven games series against the Minnesota Wild, and they wind up winning it. Mark Andre Fleury was their starter. Then there's a quick turnaround, a couple days later. They start the series in Colorado and they just throw Robin Leonard to the wolves

essentially and they're like, here's game one and he gives up seven goals against and it was an absolute onslaught right from the jump. And then they bring Flurry back in in game two, afford him an extra couple of days of rest, which was valuable for him at that point of his career. And things really tightened up after that. They still lose that game too, but it was much closer and competitive. And then they took off from there and wound up rallying and winning that series and so that would have been an interesting test case. Not necessarily an equivalent to this current situation, but an interesting thing to think about nonetheless. Well, yeah, because Walsh, that's so much younger, right? Like, this is a guy just starting his career versus

flurry winding it down at that point. But to your point, like, also a young goaltender who's never been in this spotlight for this long, a young goaltender who just went through a series in Dallas where, again, I wasn't at the rink. I don't know what the weather was like outside there, but like I've talked to goalies about ice condition, how much fluids you lose when it gets hot in Dallas. Again, we talk about going to altitude in Colorado. I don't know what combination of factors led to that decision, just throwing out some of the things that may have.

And quite often when you talk to goalie coaches about switches like that, the math isn't just about the other guy coming in. It's also about the need or their perceived need for a little bit of a reset that you don't often get during the playoffs to, you know, Maybe there's something in his game that they're just like, man, they went to town on this. And we've seen this. It's been creeping in, but we haven't had time to work on it because it's been every second day. Let's take a practice.

Let's do some drills that we know make him feel good and get him to this spot or get him to, you know, that spot, both mentally and physically. And then we've got the best version of our best goalie for the rest of this series. Well, and that's something I've thought about because you and I, every time I have you on, we have these conversations about this changing dynamic in the NHL with workloads for goalies and how much more carefully it's being managed and the days of the workhorse goalie being long gone and us heading towards these 50-50 splits. And especially looking at a lot of the goalies who are now participating and being heavily featured in round two, I think you could apply a similar thing to Jacob Dobesh, for example,

and maybe that would have been an even better example for the Marc Andre Fleury thing I said. He's certainly still on the much younger side based on his current, age, but coming out of that game seven environment in Tampa and then I know they got the extra day off in between the series, but still it's what, 72 hours later, all of a sudden you're jumping in back to another road game against a different opponent and a very dangerous one at that in Buffalo. And it's not necessarily a position to succeed. And in general, I think something to consider is as workloads are decreasing for goalies,

especially ones who are on the younger side and haven't gone through this before, all of a sudden you're jumping into the playoffs. And if you're playing well and you're advancing, you're probably going to keep getting the crease and keep getting more opportunities. And then you're getting into a spot where Jakobovesh is starting eight straight games over a, what, a 17-day stretch or something like that.

And he never really prepared for it because he never was asked to do so in the regular season. And so you're almost now taking a test in the most pressurized environment and situation that you never really prepared for necessarily in terms of actually having, previous reps to fall back on that are a similar situation

to what you're in right now. So I get why teams are playing goalies less than the regular season and they're theoretically going to be fresher heading into the playoffs, but then all of a sudden now you're just being asked to do something totally different. Yeah.

Yeah, it's like, and I've said this for tannums that go back and forth during the season and the old cliche, but if you don't have a number one, you know, if you have two number ones, you don't have a number one that they used to say. And like I just,

I know there's that hesitation to go back and forth. But if it works all year, you know, in the Boston, the year that Lena Selmark won the Vesna or, you know, when it was him and Swainman and the relationship they had. Like you go back and forth all year and then all of a sudden you don't in the playoffs. And it's, you know, it's a double-edged sword. It's like, okay, yeah, they're arrested because you went back and forth all year. But now they're doing something they haven't done in a while.

So it doesn't mean they're not capable, but are you getting the best out of them? if you change the workload, the way they have to work, you know, their ability to get reset time with the goalie coach, all those things sort of shift when you change their dynamic so dramatically. And the one example that, you know, hey, they sweep their way to the conference final, it's going to be irrelevant. But the one where I thought we'd see it was probably in Carolina.

And honestly, I still believe that after that double overtime in game two of the first round, if there's not two games between that and game three, on the road in Ottawa, I thought there was a chance you might see a switch there. Yeah, you and I last time talked about that at great length. Listeners really enjoyed that. It was very, you know, you and I are generally in agreement. We had a very spirited back and forth and debate about Freed. Hey, hey.

And how'd that pan out for me? I actually got one right. It's not very often. Let me tell you that. He's been awesome since. I think I ultimately, in terms of that argument, though, I think I brought you over to my side a little bit because I was expressing concern about some of the sloth. I'd seen in game two against the senators.

And I think that was objectively true despite the results. By the end of that I think really benefited them. And then the break between rounds one and two as well, certainly helping they get an extra day here between games two and three of Philly. We'll talk more about that later. He's the only guy in these playoffs with Stanley cut like legitimate like number one cup experience. Like not cup winning, but playoff experience. It's really fascinating to look at what's left here.

It is. I was thinking about that. So out of the, there's eight goalies left, essentially, who are starting the majority of their team's games at this point. And we might see some more switches along the way. And a team like Buffalo, for example, already has made a switch going from UPL to Lyon as this postseason has progressed. But the eight guys are making less than $22 million combined this season, which is like an average of 2.7 or so. I mean, yeah, Lucas Dostal, who we'll talk about in a second, is on the very high end at 6.5. And then I think after that, the highest paid goalies, Dan Bladar had 3.35, right?

Is Dostel probably your only like unquestioned number one goalie out of this whole mix? Yeah. And he's arguably, I know he nearly had a shout out in game two. And we will talk about that in a second. I thought in round one, he probably played the worst out of all of these guys, despite his team advancing. Yeah, I know the only goalie with worst numbers in the first round was his opponent, Connor Ingraham. Yeah. Well, you just got to be better than your opponent in the playoffs. So that's all that matters.

Let's quickly end on wild abs because, you know, I think regardless of who's in Ed, and I assume it'll be Walsett coming back in game three, the difficulty for them beyond the opponent is not, I mean, Erickson's an ex-absence certainly hurts down the middle, but also Jonas Brodeen, I think, because in his absence, they've had to really rely on Jake Middleton to play with Spurgeon, and they've pretty much been on the ice for every single goal against so far. And so that's really her third cause. I was thinking about, you know, jumping from one opponent to another and sort of some of their tendencies.

And you can speak more on this in terms of the pre-scouting of preparation. But also, I think in general, as a series progresses, you really get a better feel for how teams are trying to create their offense, what their shooters are going to do, how the puck's going to come off the stick. And I think goalies get a bit of an advantage settling into that once you get more of those reps. This is about as wild of a pun intended. jump from opponent from round one to round two, in my opinion, because that Star's power play was absolutely preposterous, and they had a lot of success, and there's only so much you could do against it

when they execute the way they did. But the way that team was playing in that series, the Stars 515 made life so much easier for them, I think. I know they were getting a good number of shots from the high danger areas, and they funneling pucks to the slot, but there was no rush element in that series from Dallas. They were so slow in plotting and methodical.

There was no forecheck pressure, so there were none of those quick broken plays, change of possession, and all of a sudden having to reset. And it was very sort of orchestrated, like send it down low, bring it back up high, try to tip it in front. And I know you've spoken about how Walsstead is a big goalie, certainly, but he plays even bigger because of the way he kind of presents and absorb some of those things. And so he really settled into that series and found a comfort level, I thought, and the results bore that out. all of a sudden now you jump to Colorado and especially in that game one, it's just an onslaught of rush chances, like quick puck move in, a ton of forechecking pressure and then that goal by Jack Jewry and it's just an entirely different set of shots you're facing. And I imagine that plays into what we saw as well where you've played Colorado a couple times in regular season and Wallace did played a good game against them in the regular season. But going from what Dallas was throwing at him to all of a sudden now this is just, I think, also changing.

changes the dynamic pretty significantly for a goalie like that. And pace, lateral movement, just mostly pace. And then, like you said, like in game one, it was sort of all of those things, plus their guys hit their spots. Right. So like if there's one thing in a pre-scout on Walshatt, it would be a tendency to sort of shade a little short side. Like you're looking, even though Cadre ripped some high glove short side coming down

that wing, like you're looking for sort of against the grain. And, you know, I look at it. at that goal by McCar and I think does it matter? Like that's such a good shot. Does it matter if he's slightly shaded on his angle towards his glove as it goes by the blocker? But that's like he is a goalie that is going to force you. And this is a compliment.

Like to the end degree force you to make great shots to beat him. And they made great shots on the right side of his frame based on the pre-scout. Like it's sort of, I think it all just. And that's the one part where, again, unless you're in that room and talking to the goalies and know the goalie coach and see what he's seeing and hear what he's hearing that's leading him to maybe lean a different direction and give Walshded the game off, that's the one part that made me wonder about the decision to go against him. Because like I said, even after that game, he was still above expected, which shows you

how remarkable he was in the first round, giving him a chance to adjust to that. maybe it did require the game off, but guys aren't going to hit their spots like that. You know what I mean? Like it was just this, it felt like this like perfect and for goalie, imperfect series of events. Like everything just went against him. Time and space for the wrong guys and they all hit their marks. And I don't know that that's going to happen on a regular basis, even against the team as good and talented.

And to your point, dynamic transition office. is such a big part of playoff success. That's the one thing that I'm sort of playing catch up with on Steve Valacette, who's sort of dug into the numbers a little more. We both used to reference a stat like a defensive metric that was almost an absolute come playoff time in terms of who wins the series. And it was just based on, you know, how many goals did you give away? Five on five high danger chances against.

And some of the teams that I did not think would have success in the playoffs because they were really bad at it in the regular season are having. success and it's the transition stuff it's the it's the quick attacks the other way like on an offensive metric that seemed to be a bigger part of this so much as your ability to prevent it and so you know i feel like a colorado like to your point does all those things really well and then they finished at an elite level in that one game and i that's the one part of of that decision where you're like can they do that again like can they and i guess we'll find out in game three because i assume we're going to see wallstead and i guess if you're the wild

you maybe had to get your answer. You know, you didn't give Gustafson a chance. Olympics didn't go great. Four nations didn't necessarily go great. He's been really good, but in those moments, it hasn't gone as well. Even though he came in with like a really pretty good career playoff, say, percentage.

Yeah, that's the other part of this. I don't know what that does for him long term there. Yeah, I talked about this with Mike Kelly last week about the idea that I think we all. all have this preconceived notion about what the playoffs look like based on historical trends that the game slows down, things get bottled up in the neutral zone, and a lot of those free-flowing rush opportunities that were previously available in the regular season aren't there. And so you have to be more creative, I guess, or work harder to create your scoring chances to get them. And that was

not the case in round one. I think the team that generated more rush chances, By my tracking, one pretty much every single series. The two exceptions were Golden Knights Mammoth, and they were pretty much neck and neck. I think the Mammoth wound up with one more rush chance than the Golden Knights. They were pretty even there. And then Habs Lightning were similarly very close to Lightning. Had a couple more, but it was pretty much a coin flip.

And all the other ones, especially like Philly, Pittsburgh, where it was so one-sided in that regard, the team that generated more in transition wound up winning. And so I'm curious to see if that continues as the post-eastern, season goes on. Unsettled offense. That's the phrase I was looking for in terms of the quick strike counterattack, but also chaos, stupid oversimplified word, but so many of these goals are being scored off broken plays. And look at how many teams we're seeing when they do get into in-zone

settled offense. They're not even trying to funnel it to the net anymore. I shouldn't say that. they are also in addition to trying to get it to the net and get bodies and create some of these bounces and broken plays, they're just throwing pucks off the end boards on purpose. Again, we talk about working low high. Like that's another thing where you completely take away a goalie's ability to keep the play and what's going on in front of him away from him. Like teams are throwing it wide of the net,

sometimes looking for the wide tips, but sometimes just looking for that bounce off the end boards. Like I don't have a number on this, but boy, it sure feels like. not only when I watch the goals, but when I watch the games, we're seeing that way more often. We saw it in the Dallas-Minnesota series for sure. I find that really interesting at a time where a lot of the funneling it through the low slot,

stuff across the middle of the ice below the hash marks is a number that we've seen go up increasingly over the last five to seven seasons. But now, like the broken play goal is where there's so much randomness to it. And yet if you win enough of those battles to get those chances, or to have bodies or to create that traffic, like those are numbers that sort of tend to skew towards the winners in a lot of these series. You got any notes on Scott Wedgwood on the other end

of the coin here in this series? Because, you know, I thought he was excellent in game two, gave up his fair share goals in that game one shootout as well. But I was thinking about him from a workload perspective because he turns 34 in a couple months. This is his 14th pro season. And I was going through his year by year workloads. And you pretty much have to go back to like, I mean, he's never done this in the NHL, certainly,

where game three is going to be his 52nd appearance of the season combining regular season in playoffs. His previous highs where he played 51 games in the HL for the Rochester Americans in 2018, 19. And then he played like 48 games in the ECHL for the Treadin Titans in all the way back in 2012, 13. and that's all he's done in his pro career in terms of even going over 40 games and now he's going into the 50s and the sweep in round one I think helps it bought them a ton of time off.

They had what eight days between rounds one and round two? They're up to nothing in this series. There's also so much run support that as goalies get at this point and I think on a stress level perspective that decreases things quite a bit and makes it more manageable for their goalies but I'm curious if you have any takes on that

because it's been entirely his net. We haven't gotten a sniff of McKenzie Blackwood yet. And I imagine if things keep going this way, the abs are going to have no reason to change their plans. So great point on the breaks. I would throw back even to the Olympic break. Probably was beneficial for him in a year where he's playing a lot more in terms of just sort of that accumulation

of miles and reps. I mean, Scott takes incredible care of himself. So I'm not really worried about that. The mental grind of it, I think the maturity that comes, with the experience he has. And I had this conversation with a goalie coach the other day from another team that's not in the playoffs,

but has had a lot of playoff success, you know, about sort of the mental elements of Alex Lyon and Scott Wedgwood and these sort of quote unquote journeymen getting this shot at, you know, in their 30s at this stage of their career. And everything they've been through to this point, sort of preparing them for it. Both also play a pretty high energy game. Um, there's a lot of, uh, I don't say positional aggression, people think of like the 80s and a goalie coming out to the hash marks. And it's nothing like that. But like it literally is there are some goalies whose skates never leave the blue ice. And there are goleys who will get their toes past it. And there are goleys who will get their heels past it. And, you know, like to me, that's the difference between aggressive and, and more conservative play. Um, I don't know that he's necessarily positionally aggressive, but there's just,

like he beats everything. He works really hard back down. When I say beats everything, like he beats every pass to its next spot. There's no casual drift in his game. He, you know, I think we saw that in the Edmonton series. Like if I had a criticism of Connor Ingram, who I'm a big supporter of and liked his game

during the regular season, it's when the screens became a larger part of offensive attacks in the first round, he got to them too casually. And so if you don't get there fast, if you drift over and glide because the puck's at the point. Now you're not beating that screening forward. You're not setting your lane with your eyes. You're not getting there early and picking those spots.

And so that work rate for Scott Wedgwood is always there. He's so disciplined in his game. And that comes with a physical tool. I would imagine that planning at altitude for a good chunk of the year negates a little bit of this. Again, if you know him, you know he takes incredible. Like he takes care. He's a pro.

It's such a cliche, but he's a pro. He takes care of all the details. physically and mentally. And so, yeah, I don't know. Like, it's early, right? Like, we're two games into the second round, one for a lot of these teams. So the idea of fatigue may be a little premature.

And this may be a different conversation if he advances to a conference final with Colorado based on whether it's five games or seven. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I agree. Let me just quickly, but that's where you need a goalie coach who is in tune and a head coach who is willing to trust the word of his goalie coach.

We used to have this in Vancouver with Ian Clark and Jacob Markstrom. You would see the diminishing returns in his game. They didn't even have, I remember there was one point where they had a backup, Anders Nelson who had struggled. I didn't want a game in like a year, but it's like we need to give him a game so we can get Jacob back to that, you know, like recharge the batteries up to 100%, not mentally or physically, but technically. And so having that relationship within your staff

becomes a really important part of these decisions at this time of year. Holy an Andrews Nielsen reference. Now that's remembering some guys. That was a throwback from you there. I like it. Let's take our break here. And then we come back.

We will close out today's show with Kevin Woodley. You're listening to the Hockey P.D. Ocast streaming on the Sports Night Radio Network. All right. We're back in the Hockeyedipadio Cash. I'm by Kevin Woodley. We're doing our round two goalies versus offenses they're facing. Can we finish up the first part there and I want to give a kudos.

If you haven't already folks, go read Peter Boz piece on Scott Wedgwood at the Athletic. It dropped this morning. It is, it's exceptional. There are details in there. Like I know Scott really well. I know Alex Nadelcovich really well. And there are details about their history and the relationship that I'm embarrassed to say I had no idea about his time with Frangine in the Tampa. of Bay system.

Like there's just like it's an exceptional piece. It's a long piece and it is worth every moment you invest to read it. So I do love this time of year because people dig in and you don't have the access to the goalies themselves as much. Although Scott's guy who will talk to you for a lengthy period of time on a game day in the playoffs when he's starting. Not a problem. Maybe it's because he started his career around Marty Britter.

But I find that at this time of year, you know, the reporters who have outlets that are willing to invest the time in the reporting and the required they got to go elsewhere to get the quotes and the you can't just get it from the players at this time because there's such limited access and so some of the background stuff that comes out it's you know i mean especially when you got like the the wild with uh mike russo and joe smith and there's so many great great stories right now and i just wanted to make sure i shouted that out because it uh peter made my morning reading that it was exceptional it was a great piece. I read it. And so that's a great shout. You don't need to flex on us though by telling

us that Scott Wedgwood's your close personal friend. We already know that you you grab intimate dinners with Andra Basilovsky based on PDA. No, no, no, no dinners with Assy. Um, you've mixed that one up, but and Scott, but you know what? You know what it is with Scott? See, now you got me all like blushing, but it's, and also that's, that's incorrect. Um, you know what is with Scott. He's a, he's a passionate goalie guy. Right. Like some guys, aren't. Like they don't want to talk about their craft. But like you saw the Lundquist post game with him where they talked about pads, right? And he talked about his LD measurement, LDS measurement and the limits on his pads and how he sets them up. And like Scott is just a passionate goalie guy. And so we have had

the pleasure of having them on for the pro reads video breakdowns. And as you would expect, much like Alex Lyon, the way they think the game is just the detail that goes into it is exceptional. And so it's a real pleasure to read good pieces about how we got to that point. Listen, you don't need to saw me. I love Wedgie. Ducks nights. So we're coming off of game two on Wednesday night. The ducks get the split on the road taking game two.

I think they should feel pretty good about the position they're in, heading back home for games three and four now, a place they've been awesome all season. I thought, you know, in particular in that Euler series, those three games at home, they just totally expose them and boat race them throughout those. And yet in watching the first two games of this round two series, I think it's reasonable to suggest that Vegas is fortunate to not be down to nothing because I thought Anaheim was pretty clearly the better team for large stretches, if not the entirety of those two games.

And a couple things did them in as you'd expect from them and a young team like this, this time of year, like a couple ill-timed breakdowns in zone in game one. The special teams were Vegas' power play after what they did to the mammoth and round one has continued and held off like a crazy four straight stretch in game two to give themselves a chance. And then I think ultimately some poor execution offensively from the Ducks offense, like they've hit the post a couple times.

There's been a couple times where Hart's been out of position and they had an open net and they either couldn't get a good shot off or there was one in game two where Cutter Goce staring down an open net and Noah Hanifin kind of gets his leg in the lane and knocks it off its trajectory. Also, there was the, and I'm still irritated by this because I love Leo Carlson so much. And it should have been like an all-time highlight where he absolutely just puts multiple golden nights in a spin cycle and then sends it over to Jackson the comb and you go back and freeze frame it.

And he's got a wide open net as about as wide an open net as you're ever going to see in the end of the season. That was a sitter. And then he just sends it back against the grain and nothing comes of it. And so we got robbed of a great highlight. for Carlson there, but they've got their opportunities and they finally broke through in game two and I've been very impressed by them and Lucas Dostal on the other end came within six seconds of a game two shutout gives up that 3-1 power play goal eight, which must be very irritating for a

goalie, I imagine. The win is nice, but getting a shoutout in that spot would also be pretty cool for him. I read they haven't had one in Anaheim since 2024 as well. Yeah, I heard that, which is pretty crazy to think about, but I guess makes sense based on the defensive environment they've had for most of that time. Let's talk about Dostal a little bit because as I mentioned off the top despite the win he finishes that Euler series

around one with an 873 say percentage. I thought he didn't look particularly reliable or comfortable at any point in that series and the Oilers have a good offense and especially with their top players out there they're going to put you in a bind and make life difficult for you. But I thought

Jack Michaels and Louis deBrusc were doing a great job throughout that series of talking about some of the rebounds Dostal was giving up and not even on high nature shots where he was kind of just spitting it out front and wasn't getting burned very often on him, but was a pretty precarious spot. And I think in these first two games against the Golden Knights team that causes a lot of chaos in front of the net, that's been much more manageable from him. So I think that is very encouraging. I'm curious for your take on him, because I know it's a goal you're obviously very high on and have been in the past. And kind of what your thoughts are on, on,

the start of his postseason, I guess, especially because he is one of these guys compared to the other seven players at his position that are still playing around to that's getting paid a lot right now and is very clearly and firmly entrenched as the number one guy for years down the road for his organization. Well, it's funny. You said one of these guys. Like he's one of he's, there's a lot of guys in the playoffs, a lot of really good guys and a lot of really good goalies. But there's not any the guy left. There's a bunch that could be the guy down the road. And Dostol kind of fits that. the guy in Anaheim right now and he's you know he's got a track record that that tells you he should be the guy um yeah round one the whole series was sloppy both ways um and his numbers weren't great but i've been really impressed like part of this is mental like how do you you talk about horses for courses and certain different styles different teams um you know maybe there's a little better fit here in terms of

what Vegas sends at you from a dynamic offense standpoint, as much as you talked about how well they do around the net and in front of the net, how discipline that veteran team. But I don't know that it's the same pace that Edmonton brings to it. When I did sort of the breakdown of the regular season goals, I was surprised, to be honest with you. Like there were numbers in there that made sense. Like struggling on screens is something you would expect based on his skill set.

But the East West stuff, the stuff off laterals, shocked me. You know, not just in the numbers being so far below expected. Again, in part because the ducks give up a ton of it. But just the way for such a great skater, you know, the way he was getting beat on some of those. I haven't seen that in the playoffs. A little bit at times during Evanton. Maybe part of it was the Oilers not trying to go east-west as much.

Like I wondered where their scouting report was. The ducks, you know, maybe some of this is the ducks. The ducks gave up like an average of three high danger slot line chances a game when Lucas Dustoll is in that. And in the Edmonton series, there were only seven in the six games. You know, and again, you'd think that focus would be there, but maybe the focus on taking it away helps. At the end of the day, he has settled in the second round

and looks like he looks more like the guy that we expect. And again, I don't know how much of that is his team. I don't know how much of that is the nature of the attack being better suited to his strengths right now. But usually when you see those rebounds spill, like rebounds off the pads, which the ducks went to school on against Connor Ingram and the Oilers, like there's normally so much you can do about that as a goaltender. The ones that frustrate a goalie coach or have a goalie coach going,

hey, we got to have that, we got to control that, are the ones sort of up off the body. And the number that have sort of spilled off there where it's a little too high for a gut trap, but you'd still like to be able to sort of catch that against your body with their glove and control it. Those are the ones that are, you know, a little more troublesome. I think they've gone down as the playoffs have gone on. I've talked about that tendency to sort of drive with his knees and his upper body separates rather than moving as one piece into the puck.

There's a real sort of separation between upper and lower body. And that can lead to a lot of those rebounds. You sort of pull your shoulders back and become rigid and you lose your hands for even that half click because it's that separation and then go to the puck. And I see that in a lot of those rebounds. But I almost feel like as the playoffs have gone on, there's a little less like he's staying over pucks and moving into them. a little bit more.

I don't know if that's a focus, something they're working on in practice, but it just, it feels like that's coming back a little bit with time. And if you're the rest of the NHL, it's like, oh crap, because the ducks are a great team. We've seen that.

And we know how good Lucas Dostol can be, right? And so if he builds that confidence here throughout the second round, yeah, the Ducks might have something going here that could last a lot longer than that. Yeah, I thought, It was an impressive two games from them. The third period of game two, it started getting a little dicey,

even while it was still 1-0 and then 2-0, where there were a couple of mad scrambles in front, and the Golden Knights do this a lot, to your point about chaos and broken plays, where he was kind of swimming around, and they had some seemingly open nets to shoot at, and I think there was one where Michael Granlin had a great block, another one where Lacombe kept it out while Doe Stahl was out of position.

And so he got some help from the guys in front of him, and maybe that speaks to... You're going to need that. An added level of defensive detail and attention that maybe we didn't see from them in the regular season as well and not something you want to rely on necessarily with your goalie not in the frame and a defender just kind of standing there

trying to block it with their body, but you're going to need those if you're going to be successful in the playoffs. I'm curious for a take on the Golden Knights offensively because especially in that round one series against the mammoth, sport logic, had them just pummeling them in inner slot shots. I think it was 58.

26 by their account in favor of the Golden Knights, which was the biggest discrepancy of any round one series. And the Golden Knights do so much of their damage in that high danger area, dots down and a lot of just personnel driven because of the guys they have. So we can talk about that a little bit of a bit of a rant, which doesn't apply to some of the clear site stuff you use because I think they do a better job of kind of parsing this and stripping out the nonsense. but I've been tracking all the scoring chances through this postseason myself and then kind of referencing the NHL's play-by-play

data that they're officially using for a lot of the public metrics and they're back on their BS again I think in terms of overcounting rebounds some of the stuff that's happening around the net in these games is absolutely crazy from a data keeping perspective like every single one of those scrambles registers as four or five high danger opportunities

and then you go back and actually watch the play and says like Nick Dowd got three shots from six feet out and then you go back and watch it and none of them were actually shots or testing the goalie and we're not going to go in but they count as high danger ones regardless and so this is happening for every team across the board but I do think in the regular season they've done a better job of stripping some of that stuff out and it seems like in the playoffs were back to crazy overcounting around the net in these games well I mean Vegas as of this morning, high danger chances at even strength

as a rate stat, like expected goals leads the playoffs right now, even higher than Carolina by clear sites numbers. Defensively, they're a little more mid-pack, but I mean, those are, you know, I don't know what, I haven't looked at the public data to see that.

I wouldn't be surprised by that. Like, that chaos that I talked about is hard to measure. Easier to create sometimes than it is to actually measure. I do think they're, you know, again, like a six-foot shot right in front of a goal. Like there's nowhere for that puck to go if I'm in position from six feet. And I don't, and there's not enough time and space to make it a reactive corner pick

or I'm on my goal line versus that same six-foot shot after a lateral pass is quite often a, you know, like Jackson-Lacombe sitter, you know, that he passed back the other way from, from Leo Carlson. Like those are so, I think you just need more context, right? Like distance just isn't enough contacts in some of those scrambles. Let me go from a goalie perspective on the difference between a broken play and a rebound. I mean, a rebound as much as we don't like them because they lead to some of the scrambles, at least I know where it's going in theory because it hit me and I can feel it.

In theory, hopefully I saw it, but the reality of so much traffic in the playoffs is quite often you don't. But at least you feel it and you should have an idea where it's going. when it disappears into that crowd in front of you and hits a leg, you have no idea where it's going. Like maybe you kept an eye on it the whole way through or maybe is your, like chances are if it hit the guy in front of you, he was between you and your sight line. And it can go anywhere.

And so that's so much more difficult to play off of a broken play and the scrambles that result from that compared to a rebound. And I don't know, I'm guessing on the NHL play by play, it's just categorized as a rebound because it's a subsequent event. after a shot, right? Like another shot and another shot. And the difference between something that goes off the goalie and something that goes off a body in front

from a goal tent perspective is huge. And it would take me a little longer just because I'm computer challenged. But I'm willing to bet that I could go and find the difference pretty quickly here between, you know, like what the value is of a rebound and a broken play rebound. on a goaltender in terms of expected goals. We've talked a lot about pass off a rebound

being one of the highest scoring chances in the NHL. But broken play. I need a little more time to sort of filter it, but I bet you there's a measurable difference between the two in terms of results. And anecdotally, when you speak to goaltenders about it or having played the position at a much cruder level myself, like there's just such a difference between knowing where that next puck is going and having no idea.

I mean, that sort of seems obvious, but living it and breathing it, it's just, it's such a different thing, especially as you know, you have all these bodies charging towards the net. Thousand percent. Do you want to end with Sabres Habs, a series that we've seen one game up so far on Wednesday night? Because I've got a couple notes on the goalies involved. Fire away. We absolutely can. that's, you know, like Alex Lyon.

Like, again, just like, what a story. You know, just like, this is a real shift. And I wonder how much of this is, you know, like, it's been a weird year in a lot of ways. He is a guy who's had success in the past. I look like, like we're in the second round and sort of we talked about the guys. Like, there's no the guys left. There's no like $8 million plus goaltenders left in the National Hockey League playoffs.

There's a lot of, there's more Alex Lyons than Scott Wedgwitz. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he's been awesome, what, stopped 132 of 139 shots he's faced since coming in halfway through game two in round one. And he's giving him everything, everything they've needed, you know, on Dobish's end, I find it very interesting because that lightning series, the takes coming out of it, I didn't necessarily agree with.

And I get it, like the optics of that game seven where the shots were 29. to nine and people felt like wow, highway robbery from the HABs. Jacob Dobish had this three game stretch from game five to seven where he gives up four total goals against in that time and just the one on the power play in game seven. And Tampa looked like the dominating better team in that one. And so I think a lot of people who had just maybe tuned to that one and watched the other games more casually felt like that was representative of the series. And it was this one-sided Yarrow Halak type performance from ages ago.

and that just was not the case. Like, Dobish was awesome. And there was so many elements I loved of his game with the aggressiveness that we talked about and some of the padwork and everything. And I thought his rebound control was very good throughout. But even in that game, you look at Tampa Bay's offense and the public metrics had him at like 2.3

expected goals against that game despite all those shots. The shots were... Clearside had him at 3.35. Like, it was a little more... Surprisingly, a little more flattering in that regard compared to... to the public numbers.

The one thing I saw in Tampa in that series, just as a quick aside, the second chance opportunities that they did get in the slot, off rebounds, off broken plays, off bounces, the amount of times they put it back towards the net along the ice was borderline maddening against a goal tender with that amount of length

and extension and low net coverage. Like Dolbush is athletic, but he uses his length in a very, it's explosive but like from a net coverage he builds everything from the ice up like you're just every once in a while you'd be able to pound one back through the five hole before he seals it up because you know to move out of a wide butterfly you've got to lift the knee and and there's inherently a little hole there for a split second but for the most part I just like you've got to elevate your second chance opportunities even off east like you he is going to almost like vasselis

at the other end he's taken away the bottom of the ice and I thought in a lot of their good look they pounded it right back into the pads. They did. And that's another point in the argument of I thought their offensive approach or execution was pretty inefficient. I mean, even in that game seven, like their leader in scoring chances was Oliver Bruckstrand. And he scored three five-on-five goals in 80 games this season and was just not good as a shooter.

I like, I'd want to give him. I want some true serum to him. And did you read the scouting report? Dude, if he tried to go high glove on a goalie where the book was low gov one more time, I was going to lose it. Well, he had that one sequence in particular with like two shots from inside the circle that were just back to back essentially. And he tried to do the same thing. And it's like, yeah, that's probably not going to work. Maybe he stopped doing that.

He's a, Dolbush is high. Like this is, you know, this is in the pre-scout stuff. But when you watch goalies like, watch this folks, where they hold their glove, like the position of it. Shooters are taught for the most part to look for that. And it's not so much physically. It's usually around the hip area. Some guys will hold it up around the shoulder. Lundquist was famous for that to take away that visual space.

But if the fingers are up, almost like you're holding your hand out, like a stop sign, like stop, maybe not to that extreme, versus the hand being extended in a more like you're going to shake somebody's hand. Like if the fingers are up, shoot low glove. Because that fingers up, and we saw it. There was a goal in that series where, you know, quite literally there's a replay from behind the net and I wash it after you can see as it's going low glove,

like that motion from that fingers up stop position to sort of turn that hand over to access pucks just over the pad. Like it's just a delay. There's no way to do it smoothly. And so this is a bit of a give and take and goaltending that shooters need to look for it. And I felt like Tampa pounded second chance opportunities off the pads, but far too many times on the open looks.

They were feeding it right into where his glove is, at its best, which is high glove. And yet even in that series, when they did go low glove, we saw them have some success. They didn't funnel nearly enough pucks just over the paths. They didn't. I think the one thing Dobish does deserve credit for that's underrated is, you know, we talked a lot about how close that series was and the stats are pretty bonkers for it, where like nearly 70% of the game time was a tied score.

There were less than six minutes total spread over those seven games where it wasn't a one-goal game either way and the stress level involved there in terms of how little margin for error is, whether it's tied or whether you're holding on to a one goal lead or you're trying to keep your team within one shot and you don't want to go down to. And so you have to make the save. I do think that's an important part of the equation here from a goalie perspective and makes life much more difficult. Like I was mentioning that for the Wedgwood stuff. And I know even in that King series, it was pretty close for the most part in terms of the scoreboard. But the stress level, relatively so much lower because even if you get up a goal against you probably should feel

pretty good about the fact that your team's going to go back and score another one for you. Whereas in that round one series it felt like next goal wins for a lot of it. And that makes every save, I think, that much more consequential and really impacts the goalie. Don't get me wrong. As I break down the pre-scott, like, he was incredible in that series. And that's a great point by you. We often get to, we can talk about all the things you see on video that happens between the pipes, but we don't get a look between the ears.

And one of the questions about goaltending is, as the moment gets bigger and the spotlight brighter, do you stick with your game or do you start to do things that are uncharacteristic? Like, do you stick to your foundation? Do you play your game under the pressure that was so immense in that series? And he absolutely did. I can count on one hand the number of times he lost his net east-west, right? Like the aggression that everybody praises him for north-south,

like five minutes into the series coming out on Eric, churnack like just exploding out of his net that's fine it starts from like his he beats plays from a conservative initial depth to get on angle and then when he reads open look he will come out where he's struggled in the past is chasing plays east west outside of his post i think the conversation in the goalie community has shifted and it hasn't caught up outside of the goalie community depth is not about relative to the goal line nor south it's also relative to your post east and where he gets into trouble is when he starts to chase plays east west. We saw it twice in the series.

Once in game one that made me nervous, he missed his post on a post entry and was caught outside of the net, on a tap in the other way. And I think it was game four where Point made a good move, got him biting. He was way outside of his left post. And he used that length again to reach back with the paddle. And again, like, great save, great highlight reel.

But I guarantee you when Marco Marciano went over foot. with him at some point it was hey like we have to be more contained than that we can't get caught out but those are the only two instances where i even remember him being outside his post what he did mentally in that series was just another great indicator of how special a talent they have there and i'm going to give another shout out and i know the media's kind of caught on to this a little bit i think uh elliott friedman has referenced it uh and uh there was a story i think stew cowen had a good story on this as well. The work he does with Pete Fry,

the goalie mindset guy who's based out of here in Vancouver. Over Engel, we've actually run single day webinars and clinics with him and young goalies. And I've been in the room. Actually, I've been in a restaurant, sort of maybe pulling my hoodie over my ears

and putting my head down as Pete will walk a professional client through his pregame routine. Like just no hesitation in the middle of the restaurant. You are powerful. You are. Like, it's a really cool thing. And, you know, from the outside, it might even feel a little hokey.

But the number of guys at the pro level that have benefited from it, including Jacob Dolbisch, right up to the NHL, like the way he works his mindset stuff. And it's actually now in the virtual reality, the NHL Senserina. You can put on the virtual headset that a lot of NHL goalers are using, Devin Cooley, Joey DeCorp increasingly. And you can actually get. a Pete Frye goalie mindset walk through where he'll, he'll, you, you make a save and it's like, you are powerful in the crease. Goleys want to be you. GMs want to sign you. Like, it's

that type of stuff. And it's, but it works, man. And it helps fuel like we are. He always says, we, we walk into the picture we form in our minds. And I'm paraphrasing, maybe I've got that wrong. But that's why his visualization with Jacob, the day. before the Vasilevsky game seven was him visualizing Andre shaking his hand in the lineup and congratulating him and wishing him success moving forward. There's a long story guys like Jeff Glass, longtime miners, you know,

creating these pictures and ended up making the NHL the year. He started working with Pete Frye. So another example of that and a guy that we know really well over at Engel, so I got to give him a shout. I'm full of shoutouts today. Yeah, seriously. Speaking of the stress level, And it's early in the series, but I do think, you know, along the lines of going from one opponent to another and the challenges that are going to be provided for you and watching that game one, I thought it was pretty clear that the sabers are like the pace they play with he talk about is is so much higher.

And they dominated off the rush in that game. Now the haves played that game seven are jumping into a new series in pretty short order on the road. And so I imagine there will be an adjustment moving forward. but that really stuck out to me the turnover chances as well and the Sabres team was so good off the forecheck. They just pummeled the Bruins in round one doing so. They had success with that yet again. And it was almost an entirely different game script where the final shot count was very heavily in favor of the HABs. But the actual chances and particularly the dangerous ones that are most likely to goals off the rush and off the forecheck and broken plays were pretty firmly in favor of the Sabres, especially at 5 on 5.

and, you know, they hit the post, I think, three times during it, had a bunch of great chances. And so there's that. There's also, like, you mentioned that churnack chance very early in that round one series. I think it's a different calculus when it's like Bowen Byram coming downhill the way he was in game one. And that's the shot making compared to churnacker. It's not just even, it's not just a shot making.

It's, you come out that far, man, there's a, like, if they can funnel it off to the sides, there's a lot of empty net behind you. Like, it's the playmaking. well. Like he's clearly a red shot when you come charging out like that. And with Eric Chernak, it's most likely going to be. But with Bowen Byram, you have to, you have to respect the fact that he can make a play and the fact that for all that skill you just talked about, the Sabres have dogs to quote the kids. Boy, do they ever. Like their skill plays with an edge. I think of Benson. I think of Don. Like, so you know, you can't come charging out because those guys are going to be

funneling off the wings to the back doors. And so even if, you know, whether it's a pass or just a second chance off that, I think, again, I don't know that Dobish wasn't out. Like, I don't think he had a chance last night on a couple of those passes that got through to the back door. But I think it's going to be increasingly important against this team that he plays a little more contained. Don't change your game, but just that chase can't be there against this group.

You better pick your spots a little more. judiciously. It's odd to say that given the talent of the group he just got passed in Tampa Bay. But, you know, outside of a hand, a couple of players, I didn't, I didn't think they executed those types of plays as well against him. No, they didn't. That's a really good point. All right, Kevin, we've got to get out of here.

I will let you promote some stuff. I feel like you've done all a lot. Oh, I've shouted out. I'm shouting out everyone. We got NHL Senserina. We got Pete Fry. We got Peter Baugh. We got Stu Cow.

And we're just shouting them all out. So I will quickly say that I thank my bosses again at NHL.com for letting me do the breakdowns. They're up. I think each series has a sort of series page. We can go find the goalie breakdowns that we did on these guys. It's kind of fun to follow along and see the tendencies. And I feel like the Leonardo DiCaprio meme every once in a while when a goal goes in. I'm like, that one.

I know that one. And then just ingolemag.com, if you're a goalie, we'll make you a better goalie. Breakdowns from NHL goalies on how to read the game, how they read the game, why they choose certain safe selections, depths, all those things. If you're not a goalie, it's not for you. If you are, come check us out. We have some fun. All right, buddy, we'll keep up the great work. You've done it again.

Delivered another PDCAS banger for us. We will have you back on early in the conference finals and we'll do this all over again with the new matchups. Then if you enjoy today's show, give us a five-star. review wherever you listen subscribe to the PDOCAST patreon as well a lot of new stuff on the feed we had harmon on to talk abs wild we had chris peters on reacting to the draft lottery a bunch of fun stuff coming so join us there and that is all from us for today thank you for listening to the hockey pdocast streaming on the sports net radio network