Penalty Killing and Goaltending 101

By Paul Bruno

An open letter to the Toronto Maple Leafs

It’s time to go to hockey school.

I will preface these remarks by informing you, that I have coached approximately 500 games of minor hockey and have been a longtime student of the game, like few others. My studies of the game, in the early 1990’s, were actually used as the prototype for the NHL’s Real Time Scoring System. It’s as a result of that work that the league now tracks such stats as blocked shots, hits, and individual player time on ice among a host of other hockey statistics.  

Here are a couple of answers to that annual question, ‘what’s wrong with the Maple Leafs.

Let’s look at the penalty killing. The Leafs are killing approximately 50% of their shorthanded situations. That poor number is simply ridiculous. The reason for that is a lack of pressure on the puck carrier. Just take a look at how they collapse into that box formation. The four defenders are too close to one another and the forwards, in particular are leaving opposing point men with more time and space than they need to make things happen.

Conversely, what we have observed when the Leafs are on the power play, opposing teams are putting a lot more pressure on whoever has the puck. So, on the one hand we see a reaction oriented tactic and on the other we see a proactive approach. This latter, aggressive posture forces the opponent to make a play, often times before that opponent is ready. This leads to panic and mistakes. That’s how you break up a power play.

In addition, there is no reason for a player to be as wide open as Sidney Crosby was, when Jeff Finger was caught playing so high in the defensive zone, on another shorthanded tally.

Last night, Pittsburgh scored three power play goals because the Leafs were so tentative and in such a reactive mode.

It didn’t help that they were plagued by another awful goaltending effort by Vesa Toskala.

Vesa, here are a couple of tips specifically for you.

First, KEEP YOUR STICK ON THE ICE. You are being beaten in the five hole, at least once every game, and those are ALWAYS bad goals. They kill team morale and should never happen, like on Sergei Gonchar’s point shot last night

Second, move laterally in your crease when the puck goes wide of your net and comes out the other side. Last night you watched a puck go off the boards, behind you and out the other side. You chose to make a 360 spin and lost your net, surrendering another easy goal against.

Third, get your butt out of the net and start cutting down angles. By playing so deep in your goal, you are giving up too much net to shoot at.

You guys are making this game look so difficult, when attention to such basic elements should make it easy.

Tags: Jeff Finger, Toronto Maple Leafs, Vesa Toskala