Goals Against

    

    Patrick Roy has a lot to answer for.

    He popularized the "butterfly" goaltending style which evolved into the VH and current RVH techniques that are now used by just about every goalie at every level. (More on what that does to goalies at a later date.)

    At the same time he also brought into vogue a new kind of hockey guru: the goalie coach.

    Roy's coach, Francois Allaire is generally considered the first full-time, dedicated coach just for goaltenders in NHL history.

    "I took phys-ed in university in Sherbrooke," he recalled. "And I read every book I could find on goaltending. Not just the books in English and French. I found books and manuals in Finnish, in Czech, and Russian. Even if I couldn't read it or get it translated I looked at the diagrams and drills they laid out. I incorporated it all."

    The man was into goaltending.

    So was the ultra-competitive Roy, who, when the two met in Sherbrooke, was willing to listen and learn. It was a match made in heaven by the hockey gods themselves and the two developed an understanding rarely found between player and coach.

    As Roy kept winning, building his playing legend, every team wanted a goalie like him and to make that happen, most of them went looking for a goalie coach like Allaire.

    Today, of course, every team has a version of Allaire at the NHL level, and others with their AHL teams. Junior teams have goalie coaches and so do kids' teams in minor hockey.

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    Ilari Näckel has been a Finnish goaltending specialist for more than thirty years. Current Laval Rocket goalie Kaapo Kähkönen is one of his former pupils. Näckel believes the job of a goalie coach is pretty straightforward.

    "This work can be divided into two main areas: improving goalie performance and keeping them healthy. Development happens on multiple levels: technical, tactical, physical and psychological," he notes. "An experienced goalie coach can identify what needs to be done to help a goalie perform better." 

    "It's often said that evaluating goalie coaches is difficult," Näckel continues. "Are they doing a good job or not? This perception goes back to the "mystical" reputation of the role, but in reality it's not rocket science. Some basic metrics include have the goalies improved during the season? Have they over or underperformed compared to expectations? Has the team had to bring in new goalies mid-season? It's pretty straightforward really."

    When he talks about the "mystical" part of the role, he means the long-standing perception that goalies are different and coaches who've not played the position don't know enough about it to effectively help them. There's an idea that goalie coaches have some kind of special rapport with their charges the head coach doesn't understand. 

    That gives the goalie coach a lot of freedom in his or her approach to the role.

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    All this brings us to Eric Raymond. The Canadiens' goaltending coach played the position for about fifteen years, including four in the QMJHL and several more in the AHL, ECHL and Europe. His numbers were similar to those we see now from Samuel Montembeault.

    He started coaching in 2009 and worked in the Q for 7 years. In that time, he handled eleven goalies. Their collective stats came to an average of a GAA of 3.37 with a SV% of 0.880. Only one of those goalies, Jake Allen, had an NHL career. After a stint with the Hartford Wolf Pack in the AHL, Raymond was hired in Montreal in 2021.

    The Habs' head coach at the time was Dominique Ducharme. When he and Raymond were both players, they were on the same team in the French league in Europe. Ducharme was the boss in Halifax while Raymond was goalie coach of the Mooseheads. They also worked together with the Canadian national junior team in 2018. (Yeah...that Canadian junior team.) It's no surprise then, that it was Ducharme who brought Raymond to Montreal.

    "Dom and I, we always had this great relationship and in the past we always were happy every time we had the chance to work together," Raymond said at the time. "We kind of knew, were hoping anyway, for one day we could work together again. Se when he gave me the call I was really happy." 

    The relationship in Montreal didn't last long. After a horrible start in the 2021-22 season, Ducharme was shown the door. Raymond stayed.

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    Raymond is indirectly tied to Francois Allaire and his goalie coaching philosophy. Allaire's brother, Benoît, coached Raymond in junior and years later, worked with him when Allaire was the Rangers' goalie coach and Raymond a consultant with the team. Benoît was, and is, his brother Francois' biggest acolyte.

    "When I was young, every goaltender developed in his own way, had his own style," Francois said in 2017. "Everybody developed in his own way. There was no training or trends going on. There was no goaltender coaching. Now it's amazing...every pro organization has two or three goaltending coaches, one with the big club and others with players in development. And now goaltenders, every one of them, looks pretty much the same." 

    The pitfall in that philosophy is that every goaltender is not the same. They may play similar styles and practice the same techniques, but inside their heads they're individuals.

    Ken Dryden said, "If you were to ask a coach or a player what he would most like to see in a goalie...he would probably settle on something like consistency, dependability, and the ability to make the big save."

    "What these qualities suggest is a certain character of mind, a mind emotionally disciplined, one able to be focused and directed. A mind able to be under control. Because the demands on a goalie are mostly mental, it means for a goalie the biggest enemy is himself."

    At the NHL level, a goalie has practiced for thousands of hours on the ice. He knows, physically, what he's doing. A goalie coach may put him through drills to hone a particular skill, but his main job is preparing his charges psychologically. If a goaltender like Montembeault proves he can play well at the highest level, when he suddenly struggles it's probably a mental issue.

    

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    So, back to Finnish goalie coach Ilari Näckel's assessment about whether a goalie coach is successful. His first point...have the goalies improved over the season? In Raymond's case, no they have not. If we take save percentage as one of the most telling stats about a goalie's performance, in 19 games played before the Christmas break, Jakob Dobes had a SV% of 0.882. In three starts since, he's down to 0.840. Montembeault was at 0.834% in 15 starts before the break. In seven since, he's posted a SV% of 0.879.

    In Montembeault's case, there's an interesting blip in that post-holiday stat. After being sent down to Laval for a "conditioning stint" (read: shake his issues and reset) on December 16, he came back on the 28th to put up a SV% of 0.919 in his first four games. Then he started dropping again. In his last three games, he's at 0.825

     And Jacob Fowler, in five games before Christmas saved 0.911 percent of shots against. In the five games after, he's at 0.877. Every one of the goaltenders has gotten worse as the year has progressed.

    Näckel's second question about whether a goalie coach is successful is whether a goalie lives up to expectations or does not. It's difficult to say with Dobes and Fowler, as their NHL body of work is so limited. For Montembeault however, the answer is definitively no. After two solid, if not spectacular seasons in Montreal, he stood on his head in the 2023 World Championships and signed a three-year contract extension. Expectations were that he'd continue to be mostly reliable; enough to support a talented young team and give it a chance to win, at least.  

    Instead, this season has been bad. From giving up goals on the first shot of the game (four times) to whiffing on shots he should have stopped at the worst possible times, he's not exactly giving his team confidence. And when the young players who are still learning to improve in their team defence don't have confidence in their goalie, they don't play freely.

    The third of Näckel's questions is whether the team had to bring up a new goalie mid-season. On December 9, with the Canadiens looking for goalie help, they had no choice but to call up Fowler. The rookie was slated to spend the year getting used to the pro game in Laval, but the Habs were desperate.

    Therefore, all three measurements of a goalie coach's success: improving play, meeting expectations and not having to call up replacements mid-season are not in Raymond's favour. Whether it's because he's instructing the goalies to play in ways not natural to them or he's not getting into their heads in a positive way, there's something wrong.

    Since the goalie market isn't exactly full of NHL-ready replacements, the Canadiens are likely stuck with the roster they have. If they can't change the players, they may have to change the coach.

    Too bad Patrick Roy is busy.