Beating Luongo
Picking up some of the stuff from last night, here's what Terry Murray said about the Kings' inability to beat Vancouver goalie Roberto Luongo...
MURRAY: ``Against Luongo, you need traffic. When I was in Florida, we traded for him, and you know what you're getting. You knew what you were getting when he was going to be 27, 28 years old. He is that. He's one of the premier goalies in the league, and if you give those top goalies lots of free looks, then they're going to get the job done. You have to make sure you're getting a lot of traffic and putting a lot of pucks at the net. The percentage of pucks that go in, the number is pretty high. You've got to get 20 pucks to the net for one goal, or hopefully one goal. He was good tonight. He made a couple really good stops, a great glove save early in the third period where I thought maybe we would at least get the one (goal).''
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Rich Hammond has covered the Kings, on a full-time or part-time basis, since the 2000-01 season. He was the beat writer for the entire John Torchetti era and has witnessed Bob Miller singing country music in a Nashville honky-tonk bar. A native of Los Angeles, Rich has worked at the Daily News since 1999 and also serves as the paper's deputy sports editor. E-mail Rich at rich.hammond@dailynews.com.
Jill Painter joined the Daily News in 2000 and during the last eight years she's covered the Dodgers, Cal State Northridge, UCLA, Kings, golf and everything in between. Even though she's from Colorado, she still freezes in the Staples Center press box but always manages to thaw her fingers in time to make deadline. E-mail Jill at jill.painter@dailynews.com.
I'm tired of hearing about defensive breakdowns being the reason labarbera gives up goals. yesterday was a prime example. both teams had plenty of defensive breakdowns. one goalie got beat four times, the other got beat none.
btw, curtis sanford starts: 1, erik ersberg starts: 0.
The goalie match-up last night was a perfect example of how an elite goalie fares against a guy like barbs. People say he didn't play that bad...and that's the problem. We need a guy to play like Luongo, not so-so. I saw many horrible rebounds that left him out of position, scrambling to get back. If it was Luongo vs. Luongo, we would have lost 1-0, not 4-0.
Early on our guys had many chances, great chance, great shots, great effort and Luongo turned them away. We were stymied and he got stronger. It's not like their defense was that special or our offense was waaaay off, it was their goalie. An elite goalie...we're stuck with so-so.
every team aside from Vancouver, New York, and New Jersey needs a goalie like Luongo, though.
Labs needs to sit at least a game though. It's time to see what Ersberg can do. Labs is a known quantity at this point, you know what you're getting.
As i saw it, Luongo didn't play all that great and got beat a bunch of times yesterday. He was helped quite a bit from luck, in the form of the posts and missed King's shots on. That save on moller off the feed from Doughty was impressive though.
Through 9 games, the kings are giving up the second fewest shots per game in the league. It'll take some time for all things to come together, but compared to last year, they are definitely heading in the right direction. Patience...
The biggest difference between the two teams last night was not the goalies it was how the teams played defense. The Kings came out flying but the Canucks were able to stick to each player like glue. This is the first game this season where there weren't any questionable goals that was scored against LaBarbera (except for the one that didn't count at the last seconds of the second period). There was 3-4 shots that hit the post for the Kings and there were 3 times when the put was near the crease and the Kings were not around or weren't able to score on. Also the unlucky bouncing puck that caused Frolov to miss his shot on the penalty shot. This game was a team blunder not just a goalie blunder. Any other game this season anyone can make an argue that LaBarbera couldn't steal a game for the team but not this one.
J, if the Kings are giving up the second fewest shots in the league and are already dead last in the western conference, that says a lot about our goaltenging, wouldn't you think? The defense is doing their job by limiting chances.
wavesinair - All the frustration in the world isn't going to turn Labs OR Ersberg into Luongo. Even if we had Luongo, is it ok to be making these mistakes? Luongo might help mask Vancouver's weaknesses and youth, but the Kings, if they learn from all these mistakes, will be better as a whole later if they don't start pointing fingers. In a painful way, Labs may be exactly what the doctor ordered for the first half of the season.
Murray makes a good point about traffic in front of Luongo. There weren't many screened shots getting through, or attempted, and the lines need to settle a bit. Moving O'Sullivan off the Stoll line was a positive for me because Moller showed more willingness to make decisions with the puck on his stick rather than passing immediately.
Moller stays all season, he's fully developed physically.
Simmonds may not, he's going to be better with some size but I think he's playing pretty well. Do we let him grow here or elsewhere?
Could be deadcatbounce. It also could mean the D are limiting perimeter shots, but are still getting broken down down low, giving up positions with a higher chance of scoring.