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I Said I Would Try to Find a Silver Lining

  1. Face-offs were roughly even.
  2. Frolov played well.
  3. Parse was even in +/- and had a hit and a takeaway.
  4. Quick didn’t smile on the bench.
  5. The Kings had a lot of high-quality chances and could easily have been ahead by 2 or 3 by the mid-point of the game.
  6. It was basically a normal game, 0-0 with a decent amount of wide-open play, all the way until the last few minutes of the second period.
  7. 7-0 is the same as 1-0. It’s a loss.
  8. I wouldn’t say the Kings were crushed or even really outplayed. They just gave up a ****load of goals all of the sudden. I can’t even get all that riled up by the Handzus whiff. Whatever. He doesn’t do that more than once a year or so. So, in that sense, yay?
  9. Quick did not get beat upper glove side. So, good work, Bill Ranford.

Now, as for that goaltending…

I thought Quick looked shaky the whole game. There was that puck off the post that he nearly kicked into his own net. The first goal he was betwixt and between; should have had his paddle down. Second goal, the breakaway, I’ll give him a pass. Third goal? It’s not just that he got burned, or that he got caught, as Jim Fox said, in between. It was just about the most tentative lateral move I have ever seen. When the puck beat him, he was kind of halfway kneeling and almost turned toward the corner. Who does that? I have to say, at least as far as this one game goes, there was something mentally wrong with him. In context, the night off did nothing to help. If anything, his confidence is even worse.

His numbers for the night: 5.11GAA, .786SV%. Terrible. But not as bad as what came next.

Ersberg played less than half the game, gave up four goals on seven shots, miraculously made three saves, looked amateurish on the last goal, in which he went down into a butterfly to let a shot go between his legs that would have hit him if he hadn’t moved. His numbers?

9.32GAA .429SV%, nearly twice as bad as Quick. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that. Usually the starter gets pulled and the game calms down. I think I’ve seen it be just as bad with the relief goalie; but I’ve never seen it get worse. I actually thought Murray might pull Ersberg and put Quick back in. Or, you know, Peter Harrold.

One last point to make about this. In shoot-outs, the all-time league average save percentage is .670. The Kings goalies allowed 7 goals on 21 shots. That’s a .667 SV%. That’s right:

We would have done better just to let them have their 21 shots in penalty shot form.

[bonus comment: Bernier has played twice as many games in the AHL as Quick has, with better numbers. He’s hot. He’s cured his bad attitude. He’s earned it. He should be called up. Waive Ersberg. Let Bernier and Quick split the games for awhile. Problem solved.]

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