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CHICAGO - Even before the days of Turk Broda and Terry Sawchuk, everyone understood goalies should be a protected class, yet no one has ever figured out how to guarantee their safety.
The Montreal Canadiens' loss of Carey Price for the rest of the Eastern Conference Final is a reminder why protecting the goalies is on the agenda at most general managers meetings.
You can lose a key defenseman or a star forward, and teammates can soldier on. But the loss of a goalie is catastrophic. It's on par with losing an NFL quarterback.
Replay suggests New York Rangers forward Chris Kreider's collision with Price was accidental, but Montreal fans want to blame him because this isn't his first brush with a goalie collision. He is probably guilty of reckless driving to the net.
But is that really Kreider's fault? In the discussion of offensive hockey, nothing is talked about more than going strong to the net. Coaches insist on it.
"If you want to score in this league, that's where you are going to be if you want to be productive," Chicago Blackhawks coach Joel Quenneville says.
You want traffic in front of the net. You want havoc in front of the net. You are looking for chaos in front of the net. And when you have that, goalies are vulnerable.
"Such a fine line," Los Angeles Kings coach Darryl Sutter said. "If you look at the Montreal play, they're both right."
Kreider was driving hard to the net, and a defenseman used his stick to try to stop him. Price was standing his ground as he's supposed to do. Montreal forward Brandon Prust's argument that Kreider did nothing to avoid Price is worth discussing, but we all know Kreider would be in trouble with his coach if he wasn't going to the net like a freight train.
In Sunday's game, Blackhawks captain Jonathan Toews took the puck hard to the net and fell over Kings goalie Jonathan Quick.
There was controversy on the play because the puck ended up in the net. It was disallowed because of incidental contact — the right call, although it took officials time to get there.
"One guy's trying to score, which is what we try to do ever since we played the game," Sutter said. "The goalie's trying to stop the puck, so ... I'm just glad we're not talking about that today because our goalie is hurt."
But Quick could have been hurt on that play. That's the Catch-22 of the goaltender protection issue.
Everyone knows we have to do more to protect goalies. Coaches tell their defensemen to protect their goalies, and the NHL always looks to strengthen the goalie interference rule. The NHL wants goalies to be able to make a save without being bumped or jostled. Haven't we all seen goalie interference calls where the forward barely touches him?
The NHL has started to err on the side of protectiveness. But hockey people know it's impossible to protect goalies fully unless you don't allow anyone near them. It's similar to where the NFL was at with protecting quarterbacks. The NFL went the extra yard and now the game is different, but quarterbacks are protected from ugly hits.
It's difficult to know what could be done to fully protect the goalie. The NHL ecosystem is complex. But if players were discouraged from driving the net, goal scoring would become more challenging. And it's already difficult to score a goal in the NHL.
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