Building Blocks Goaltending

Between the Pipes
with Director Sean Moloney

Off season workouts (May 25, 2010)

So with the season now over, the question most goaltenders and parents ask me is "What's the best thing I can do during the offseason?". Obviously, workout schedules will differ with age and level, and most elite teams will provide specific plans to thier players. I will try to keep this as general as I can and you as an individual can determine what's best for you. Since goaltending is such a mentally demading position, the first thing I always recommend is to take some time off. Step away from the game to recharge your batteries. It's a long season, one that takes a big toll mentally on goaltenders young and old so when the season ends, take a break from the game but not altogether. Watching the game on TV is a good way to keep your enjoyment high, but it allows you to take a break from the ice to rest your body and most importantly your mind.

Two weeks is an ideal break, but it depends on your level of play and conditioning. Once you've recharged, it's time to focus on conditining in preparation for the new season. First, no matter what age or level, from 8 to 28, or from Mini-Mite to professional, stretching is something that needs to be done EVERY DAY! Stretching is not only important in your game, but also plays a large part in preventing injury. So stretch every day, once in the morning and once in the evening. It doesn't have to be for a long priod as a good fundamental stretch can be done in about 5 minutes, but it must be done every day. We'll look at the Summer as 3 months, June, July, and August.

June should be a month to begin light workouts, then build them up daily until the end of the month. (Examples: Gym once a week and off-ice workouts twice a week, then gym twice a week and off-ice 3-4 times a week. Maybe a skate once a week, but at all costs try to avoid pick-up/open hockey, and if possible find some stick time ice where you can focus on goaltender specific drills.)

July is when the work is really going to get done, especially for the older/elite goaltenders, but even for the younger ones as well. Hit the gym and Off-Ice drills HARD, up to 6 days a week. Be sure to focus on the off-ice core strength drills up to twice a day. (Again, stetch EVERY DAY, especially when your working your body the hardest.) Try to hit the ice twice a week, again avoiding the open/Pick-up groups, and try to focus on goaltender specific drills. (If you don't know any, contact us and we'll give you some great off-season on-ice drills.) It's so important to remember when your on the ice in the summer, that you focus on developing your game. If you're just playing pick-up or open hockey it's usually a lot of breakaways and odd man rushes which will hurt your technical development more than help it. Since you'll be pushing you body hard, make sure you take care of it, hydrating after every workout, in the morning, and at night. July is the best month to go to your favourite goaltending school (Building Blocks Goaltending) because your body will be prepared for the daily workouts and mentally you'll be ready to absorb the instruction.

Once August rolls around, it's time to scale things back. Cut back the off-ice to no more than twice a week, and even then limit what you do. Gym no more than once a week, and just to maintain not to build. August is the cool down period for all your work in July, but it's also going to be the charging period for the upcomng season. (Again, stretch EVERY DAY!) Keep it light, and start thinking about goals for the upcoming season. Stay in shape, but don't push yourself. You want to be full of excitment and feel great physically when you first hit the ice for training camp or that first practice.

It sounds strange since this season just ended and you're full of excitment or disappointment at how it ended, but next season starts NOW! Right now. Make sure you enjoy the summer because you worked hard during a long season! Just keep in mind your goals for next season while you're on vacation or laying in your pool, because that work starts now! I hope you all have a wonderful, safe, happy, and healthy Summer.

The Importance of Fundamentals (March 11, 2010)

The Olympic hockey competition was highly entertaining, great quality hockey featuring the best players in the world on a pressure filled stage. So why then, were there a number of terrible goaltending performances by some of the world's "greatest" goaltenders? Did Martin Brodeur and Evgeny Nabokov just have bad games at the worst times? Why was Jonas Hiller the best goaltender in the tournament? And how did a relatively unknown goaltender from Norway, Pal Grotnes, manage to have an outstanding tournament against the world's best players?

Lets begin with Martin Brodeur's 4 goal performance in Canada's 5-3 loss against the USA in the 3rd game of round robin play. Many media and fans were stunned at his performance, almost all dismissing it as a bad game at the wrong time. When looking at the goals he gave up however, the problem is far bigger than just a simple bad game. To be fair, Brodeur is a tremendous athlete with an innate ability to read a play and the game, but as a whole, his game has no technical base whatsoever. His is a game based solely on athleticism and reactivity, which for his career has been hidden by the disciplined, rigid defensive system employed by the New Jersey Devils. As we know however, today's game is based on coverage provided by solid positioning, low coverage, and good use of the body unit. When examining all 4 goals Brodeur surrendered, it's not a stretch to say all 4 would have been relatively routine saves by any goaltender with even a decent technical base. Worse still, none of the 4 goals were even off of a decent scoring chance. Simply put, Brodeur lost the game for Canada, who played a pretty solid game, outplaying the USA for most of the evening. His comments the next day of pointing fingers at his teammates is a subject we will cover in a future column. In the quarterfinals, Canada, now with Roberto Luongo in net following Brodeur's outing against the USA, faced Russia, another of the favorites going into the Olympics. Canada scored 6 goals in a little over a period on Evgeny Navbokov of the San Jose Sharks, another goaltender considered "great" despite his numerous poor playoff performances. Again, 5 of the 6 were bad goals from a goaltending standpoint, spotlighting various flaws in Nabokov's outdated game. The media and fans again cited it as a bad game, but the problem was again obvious. Even in the Gold medal game between the USA and Canada the goaltending was shaky. The tying goal by the USA in the last minute was a preventable goal, and the winning goal in OT by Canada's Sidney Crosby on Ryan Miller was an awful goal from a goaltending standpoint. All this begs the question, in an event like the Olympics with the best players in the world, why was the goaltending more often than not below average? The answer is fairly simple. The game, as it is in 2010, is one of highly skilled players, great athletes, with amazing technology in sticks and equipment. Today's goaltender, very simply, CANNOT and WILL NOT be successful without a solid, developed technical base in his game. A great team will make a bad goaltender look good for only so long. Eventually when the talent levels of both teams are equal, the flaws in the goaltender’s game will be painfully obvious to everyone, and ultimately will cost his team. So those performances by Brodeur and Nabokov were not one time instances, but a simple and accurate representation of their fundamentally weak games.

To further Illustrate how successful a great technical base can make a goaltender, look at Pal Grotnes, the goaltender for Norway. Many in the media and those watching on TV marveled at how well he played and how consistent he was against world class competition. He put up numbers that were amongst the best of Olympic goaltenders. While certainly not one of the "best Goaltenders in the world", Grotnes, a carpenter and part-time pro goaltender, with limited professional and no NHL experience attributed all his success, against the best players in the world on the game's biggest stage, to his fundamentals and technical game. Jonas Hiller, already a successful NHL goaltender with the Anaheim Ducks, had a tremendous tournament, keeping his overmatched Swiss team in every game while being heavily outshot and outplayed every game. Hiller was, based on statistics, the best goaltender in the tournament, and he was by far the most consistent. Once again, his technical game was the reason for his success, and was the main reason for his consistent excellence night in and night out.

The technical game is the most vital component in the modern goaltenders skill set, and the Olympics proved this. The goaltenders with technical weaknesses in their game suffered because of it, and those with the best technical components were the ones who performed at the highest levels night in and night out. Hopefully this will inspire many young goaltenders to focus on developing their technical base, and help those without a solid technical base to see the importance of working to hone this most valuable component.

Proper Depth (January 28, 2010)

Another problem I see too often is the misunderstanding of depth in modern goaltending. Most of this problem stems from the amount of coaches still stuck in the 70's and 80's who tell their goaltenders to get out of the net to cut down the angle as much as possible. Earlier this season with Robert Morris, we were playing a team whose coach was an old goalie who told me how great his goaltender was because he was so aggressive. Sure enough, he played at least 4-5 feet outside his crease at all times. Unfortunately, a lot of goaltenders we work with are told over and over by their coaches to come out, often too far, and challenge the shooter. When examining why, it's important to realize that the net does not get bigger the farther you come out.

At some point you have taken up all the net there is to cover. What point this is will depend on how big the goaltender is, but for a general reference, any more than 3 feet outside the crease is going to have little benefit to you. Back in the 70's and 80's, goaltenders were taught to stand up, which covered less net horizontally, therefore they were taught to come out toward the shooter taking up as much horizontal net as they could. Today however, as we know, coverage is the foundation of the game, starting with a solid butterfly blocking position which takes up the majority of low horizontal space. Understanding this, the need for excessive depth is negated.

So what constitutes good depth, or proper depth? The answer isn't as straightforward as most coaches, or even TV commentators, will try to have you believe. Proper depth in today's game is situational, and is based on several factors. First, you should be at your highest point when the puck is at its highest point. That point is the top of the offensive zone at the blueline, the point area. As I said before, any more than 3 feet beyond the top of the crease is too far; especially if there is a shot taken from this area that the goaltender can track from the release. This shot should be a stoppable for any goaltender and negates the need for excessive depth.

The second and most important thing to remember is that excessive and unnecessary depth will prevent a manageable path to the shot lane should a pass or angle adjustment be made. Back to the goaltender RMU played against earlier in the year. He did a good job stopping and controlling the shots in the first period, which had several players crediting him with how little net they had to shoot at. Also our assistant coach was raving to me about how aggressive he was, and how he thought that was the best way to play goal. Between periods, I informed our locker room that because of his excessive depth, any minor angle adjustment or pass would leave them with a wide open net to shoot at. Six goals and a win later their coach approached me and wondered how we managed to beat him so easily. Simply put the farther out you are, the more distance you will have to travel to follow the puck. Watch any games from the 70's or 80's and you will see how often a goaltender will be way out to challenge a shooter. Then take note of how often the goaltender stood and watched the puck be deposited into an empty net because he had no way of getting into a new shot lane when a pass was made. Being aware of the situation, or reading the play, is very important to the success of the modern goaltender. This enables you to understand how much depth you need on a play in order to diminish the available net for a shooter while still understanding the possibility of having to push or move to a new shot lane if a pass is made. In that instance, the goaltender will have to give up some depth to achieve a more manageable path to the new shot lane. Yes, it will surrender a little more net for the shooter, but it will also give the goaltender an extra second to react to the shot if one is taken.

The third and final thing to remember is that depth is the least import aspect of shot preparation. Coverage, as I said before, is the foundation of the modern game and it is always the first priority in any shot-off-pass situation. This is why in back door pass situations the goaltender needs to push towards the shot lane and not towards the shooter, as the distance to the shooter is greater than the point where the puck will enter the net. Also, in pass situations to the low slot, the goaltender needs to achieve coverage by pushing to the center angle and not pushing out towards the shooter. Once on angle, if the shot is not taken, the goaltender can then make any necessary depth adjustment.

Hopefully this will help you understand the importance of proper depth in today's game. While not as important as in past decades, depth is still an important part of the modern goaltenders game, and certainly when understood and used correctly, it can help you be more successful.

Loading the Post (December 17, 2009)

Loading the post (also called the One Knee Down, or the VH Position.) is a very effective modern technique that we here at Building Blocks emphasize, and a technique that all our staff use successfully. It is a very versitile, efficient technique that has become a very important tool in many goaltenders games, helping them be more successful in certain game situations. Recently, however, I have seen too many goaltenders, including at the NHL level, giving up goals because of misuse of the technique, or technical errors in the fundamentals of the move. Even worse, it is the same mistakes I see repeated over and over. In order for you to avoid these mistakes, I will address the most common problems we see.

First, and this is the one we see most often, is understanding when to use the Load. I know it sounds simple, but we see more goals because a goaltender uses the technique in a situation where it simply will not be effective. Our philosophy at Building Blocks is never load on anything higher then the bottom of the circle. I have seen several NHL goaltenders give up goals on shots from the face-off dot or higher where they tried to execute a load as save selection. The Load, in general, is a Shot Preparation technique and it's effectiveness as such has led it to be misused and overused. The main benefit of Loading is coverage, and maintaining that coverage in a tight, lateral push situation. But in the Load position you must remember that there is a point on the ice where the coverage, especially vertically, is lost because of the distance between the puck and the net. Also, the body position of the goaltender in the Load is one that does not maximize net coverage if the puck is not at a proper positional distance to utilize the technique. Therefore, to use the Load on anything other than a tight, sharp angle shot as save selection is certainly not advised. Loading is only beneficial on anything lower than the bottom of the circles, including behind the goalline for potential passout situations. Never on anything higher.

Second is compactness. Coverage is the foundation of the modern game, and Loading the Post is no exception. Just as with a good butterfly, compactness is essential to good execution of the technique. In the 2009 NCAA Championship game, the goaltender from Miami, OH, gave up a goal in a Load position that allowed Boston University to comeback from 2 goals down and win the game in OT. He failed to achieve compactness in his Load position, and the puck squeezed through the hole. The announcers incorrectly came down hard on him for Loading, but his decision was correct. This was a situation where the Load should have been very effective and produced an easy save on a good chance. It is very important that when you load, you keep the elbows in tight to the torso, the post leg firmly against the post, and the on-ice leg on the ice and the knee in tight to the post leg pad. Having this compactness will not only prevent any pucks finding a way through you, but it will also allow explosiveness in the event of a pass or player carrying across the front of the net. It's also very important to note that you should never Load the Post without actually being on the post. Martin Biron of the Philadelphia Flyers gave up a goal in OT of the playoffs last season to Bill Guerin of the Penguins when he attempted to load without any integration of the post. Guerin simply slid the puck short side beating Biron. Obviously, if your post leg in the load isn't on the post, there is no coverage short side between the post and the pad.

Loading the post is a vital technique is the modern goaltender's game and like all other fundamentals, it needs to be executed properly and at the right time. If you do that consistently, you will stop more pucks, and win more games because of it.

To suggest a topic or if you have a question, please email us
questions@buildingblocksgoaltending.com