I think there were a few eyebrows raised on Friday when our goalie was pulled with 2 minutes remaining on the clock and we were killing a penalty. As it turned out we had some good scoring chances while playing 5 on 5 but as we all know, we failed to score the tying goal.
There is always a lot of debate about when to pull a goalie. With the NHL regular season coming to a rapid end, it looks like the last playoff spot might come down to a tie breaker. That reminds me of the end of the season in the early 70's (I was just in diapers back then of course). The Rangers and Detroit were playing an afternoon game on the last day of the regular season and Montreal and Chicago were playing in the evening. If the Rangers won in the afternoon and Montreal lost in the evening then the two teams would be tied and the tie breaker would be goals scored. So the Rangers needed to win and score a lot of goals. The Rangers played like gangbusters and early in the second period they were up by a score of 7-2. But at strategic points of the game Ranger coach Emile Francis kept pulling the goalie when the faceoff was in the Detroit end because he needed insurance goals. They ended up winning 9-5 and Detroit scored 3 empty net goals.
In the evening game, with 10 minutes left in the game, Montreal found themselves down 5-2. So Claude Ruel, the Montreal coach, pulled his goalie for the last 10 minutes to try to come back and get at least a tie. Chicago scored 5 empty net goals and won the game 10-2. As it turned out neither team scored a goal with the goalie out of the net but the two teams gave up 8 empty net goals. So don't be surprised to see some bizarre things next weekend by teams trying to qualify for the playoffs. In particular in the Leaf-Canadien game if Toronto remains 1 point back and needed a win in regulation time to grab the last playoff spot.
12 years ago
