Devan Dubnyk: how could so many organizations have been wrong?

[yave1964]

 

 Devan Dubnyk is simply the one and only reason that the Sharks, Flames, and Canucks are looking over their shoulders trying to figure out if the Wild are going to pass them and take the 8th playoff spot away from them. The Kings are watching as the Wild go zooming past. Devan Dubnyk is having simply an insane run since coming over from the 'Yotes, going 10-1-1 with a .938 save pct and a 1.60 goals against.

 

  If the Wild do pass one of these teams and make the postseason and more importantly if they win a series or two or more, votes for the team MVP might need to go to Arizona goalie coach Sean Burke, the goalie coach from the Coyotes whom Dubnyk credits with restoring his confidence and simplifying his game.

 

"He was a big guy positionally and was one of the most-patient goalies. The main focus is to get your game back, your confidence back and trying to create an opportunity for myself — whether it was a year later or into next season or down the road at some point. This is a lot earlier that I expected,” said Dubnyk to the Vancouver Province recently. 

Burke has earned a “goalie whisperer” reputation for his work with Ilya Bryzgalov and Mike Smith, turning Grade B goalies into elite-level netminders.

 

  Last year Dubnyk started the season as the number one goalie in Edmonton who entered the season with promise. Dubnyk went 11-19 with a lousy .894 save pct and was traded to Nashville when Rinne went down, and was worse there with a .850 save pct. drawing his release. He signed with the Canadiens when Carey Price was injured but Tokarski was called up, Dubnyk who had started the year as an in his prime netminder who had a starting job finished the season with Hamilton in the AHL. In the offseason, he signed with the only team even willing to give him a contract, the goalie desperate Coyotes. It was the best thing that ever happened to him.

 Dubs is a big goalie who has had coaches try to reinvent him every season, kind of like Steve Mason had after his brilliant rookie year in Columbus. Burke showed him how to use his size and restored his confidence and now Dubnyk is finally looking like the player that Edmonton thought he would be. Of course that was five organizations in 12 months ago.

 

 "Just finishing where I needed to be in the net, to be set always and be set on shots. That helped me find pucks and playing around with depth, I can be at the top of the crease and sometimes I can be back. It's all based on what's happening in front of me. It's been a smooth transition because of the similar ideas in the defensive zone in Arizona and here."

 

 I am big enough to admit that I was wrong, I thought the trade for Dubnyk was futile, the sucker has been amazing. Nobody expects him to have a 1.60 goals against all year (of course Harding had similar numbers last year pre-MS flare up) but if he gives the team the steady play that he has since coming out of Arizona is looking more and more as if he is for real every game.

[JR Ewing]

He's definitely hot right now, but I stick with what I always said: he's a league average goalie.

Craig MacTavish COMPLETELY screwed the pooch with Dubnyk, though... Not his only grave error, but that was probably his first. He opened his first day on the job by saying he had doubts about Dubnyk's ability to play in the NHL, and sewered the guy's confidence. The Eakins devised "The Swarm", which left opposition players open for Grade-A cross-crease chances, and the writing was on the wall.

Nashville? Well, they didn't need him, and probably acquired him to free up a bit of cap space as much as anything else.

Arizona? Trading him was a covenient way to make sure they keep losing, since he was the only goalie on the roster who was actually stopping pucks.

[yave1964]

@JR Ewing

 

It is just mindblowing to me that a player like Dubnyk can bounce around to five teams in 12 months and be the most critical player to a teams success of any player on his team, possibly in the entire league.

 

   You have said forever that Dubnyk is a league average goalie while I have been a bit more critical, it took Sean Burke to get him straightened out and not only meeting but exceeding expectations.

[TropicalFruitGirl26]

Guys, I can buy into the fact that Dubnyk found his groove with some good coaching, but, he also had some talent of his own all along that simply wasn't properly channeled until he met the right goalie coach.

I think everyone is aware and agrees that goalies, in general take a while to mature...even more so when you have a large goaltender who needs to learn to cover whatever areas his long legs may leave open to shooters....while still being able to pop back up to avoid being beat up high.

 

Things like that are sure difficult to foster on a team like the Oilers who play little to no physical defense and give up way too many shots and scoring chances than is good for ANY goaltender....let alone one trying to find his way like Dubnyk was.

 

Nashville? Good team in front of him, but really...was he EVER going to get a fair shake with Rinne and Hutton over there? Not really...he was a spare part at best there.

 

Arizona? Well...at their essence, Arizona is a good defensive team. Yea, yea, I know....they really haven't played like it this season, but when they play their best games, they have always been sound defensively and in goal. And when they are good in goal, Arizona is ALL ABOUT Mike Smith....anyone behind him, again, is secondary to the max. And its pretty telling when a team like the Yotes, WITH a struggling defense, WITH a struggling Mike Smith STILL didn't see to it that Dubnyk had any real shot to dethrone Smith as their number one.

I looked and Dubnyk's numbers with the Yotes actually weren't that bad.

 

Then he goes to the Wild with nothing to lose really....and the team at the stage THEY were in, had nothing to lose as they were already on the verge of being flushed out of eveything...and BAM...Dubnyk puts to use whatever he picked up from Arizona, and he finds himself behind a mostly solid defensive team in the Wild, who also happen to have forwards, who while having some consistency issues of their own, still represent quite an upgrade to what Dubnyk was used to.

Really, what goalie DOESN'T like a good combo of offense and defense in front of him?

 

It's the whole confidence game I think. Dubnyk had the confidence in the team that they would play better in front of him than the Oilers or Yotes would (he got about zero chance to test the Preds in front of him), and the team, in turn, with a last gasp, figured, hey, this HAS to provide better goaltending than what we've gotten to this point, let's just play our game and let the goalie do his thing.

 

Right place, right time for both goalie and team, some things happen to fall just right during games, it breeds even MORE confidence, and off they both go....

 

No matter what happens this season though, the Wild, IMO, would still need to look into the goaltending situation and make some hard choices on whom to keep, or even if they need to trade for another one.

As good as Dubnyk has been, yea, this IS rather unusual, and one can't seriously expect him to be THIS good for the balance of his career. If he indeed is riding a magic chariot, it may turn back into a pumpkin at any time.....

 

If he truly is a league average guy like @JR Ewing seems to believe, then it might not be out of the realm of possibility for him to return to being just that come next season.....or gasp...even later THIS season.

 

But as the Wild did with Bryzgalov last season, you ride the guy till the wheels fall off.

Minnesota has not even sniffed in Darcy Kuemper's or Nik Backstrom's direction during this win/points streak...and why should they? Dubnyk to this point has not given them a reason to change the goalie.

 

I don't know for how long this will go on, but the Wild are doing the right thing in milking this for all they can.

And for Dubnyk, even if the doesn't get re-signed by Minny after the season (UFA), he could possibly, as some have alluded to, use this to play his way onto another team with a nice contract.

[jammer2]

  Dubnyk is the perfect example of a goalie succeeding in a coaches system. If he went to any other team, the results would have been MEH....but he fits the strategy of the Wild very nicely.

[JR Ewing]

I would say that I have nothing against the idea of a good goalie coach helping and improving Dubnyk's play. It could be the case. In his first 139 games in EDM, he had an average SV%. Then, he and his wife had a kid, and he admitted he was distracted, exhausted most of the time, and then Eakins implemented a system that he later admitted was a poor choice for his team. Dubny's numbers suffered and he was dealt. He had those same numbers with the Coyotes. And, now in Minnesota, he's hitting about 15 points above that.

Given enough games, he probably goes back to something close to a .910-.915 SV%, which would be great for the Wild, because it's a lot better than they were getting before.

[OccamsRazor]

Devan Dubnyk is having simply an insane run since coming over from the 'Yotes, going 10-1-1 with a .938 save pct and a 1.60 goals against.

 

That is simply amazing i will say....he seems to have made others there in net expendable.

[Hatrik98]

Dubynk has always been a good goalie. It always helps when you have a half decent Defense behind you. I'm sure that's where his confidence dropped. But in Minnesota they have been known to have a good defense and I think Dubynk and the Wild are a perfect combo. I think they could be a threat in the west if the offense would stay consistent.

 

 Devan Dubnyk is simply the one and only reason that the Sharks, Flames, and Canucks are looking over their shoulders trying to figure out if the Wild are going to pass them and take the 8th playoff spot away from them. The Kings are watching as the Wild go zooming past. Devan Dubnyk is having simply an insane run since coming over from the 'Yotes, going 10-1-1 with a .938 save pct and a 1.60 goals against.

 

  If the Wild do pass one of these teams and make the postseason and more importantly if they win a series or two or more, votes for the team MVP might need to go to Arizona goalie coach Sean Burke, the goalie coach from the Coyotes whom Dubnyk credits with restoring his confidence and simplifying his game.

 

"He was a big guy positionally and was one of the most-patient goalies. The main focus is to get your game back, your confidence back and trying to create an opportunity for myself — whether it was a year later or into next season or down the road at some point. This is a lot earlier that I expected,” said Dubnyk to the Vancouver Province recently. 

Burke has earned a “goalie whisperer” reputation for his work with Ilya Bryzgalov and Mike Smith, turning Grade B goalies into elite-level netminders.

 

  Last year Dubnyk started the season as the number one goalie in Edmonton who entered the season with promise. Dubnyk went 11-19 with a lousy .894 save pct and was traded to Nashville when Rinne went down, and was worse there with a .850 save pct. drawing his release. He signed with the Canadiens when Carey Price was injured but Tokarski was called up, Dubnyk who had started the year as an in his prime netminder who had a starting job finished the season with Hamilton in the AHL. In the offseason, he signed with the only team even willing to give him a contract, the goalie desperate Coyotes. It was the best thing that ever happened to him.

 Dubs is a big goalie who has had coaches try to reinvent him every season, kind of like Steve Mason had after his brilliant rookie year in Columbus. Burke showed him how to use his size and restored his confidence and now Dubnyk is finally looking like the player that Edmonton thought he would be. Of course that was five organizations in 12 months ago.

 

 "Just finishing where I needed to be in the net, to be set always and be set on shots. That helped me find pucks and playing around with depth, I can be at the top of the crease and sometimes I can be back. It's all based on what's happening in front of me. It's been a smooth transition because of the similar ideas in the defensive zone in Arizona and here."

 

 I am big enough to admit that I was wrong, I thought the trade for Dubnyk was futile, the sucker has been amazing. Nobody expects him to have a 1.60 goals against all year (of course Harding had similar numbers last year pre-MS flare up) but if he gives the team the steady play that he has since coming out of Arizona is looking more and more as if he is for real every game.

[Hatrik98]

@JR Ewing

 

It is just mindblowing to me that a player like Dubnyk can bounce around to five teams in 12 months and be the most critical player to a teams success of any player on his team, possibly in the entire league.

 

   You have said forever that Dubnyk is a league average goalie while I have been a bit more critical, it took Sean Burke to get him straightened out and not only meeting but exceeding expectations.

Burke might of helped his confidence but I think gong to a team with a defense and that could score might of helped a bit too..

[hf101]

@JR Ewing

 

It is just mindblowing to me that a player like Dubnyk can bounce around to five teams in 12 months and be the most critical player to a teams success of any player on his team, possibly in the entire league.

 

   You have said forever that Dubnyk is a league average goalie while I have been a bit more critical, it took Sean Burke to get him straightened out and not only meeting but exceeding expectations.

 

There is more to this as stated in a interview with Dubnyk

 

 

There was, however, one significant change this summer.

Dubnyk adjusted how he works on tracking the puck, a change which puts him on the cutting edge of a new tool some believe will be the biggest thing for goaltending since the butterfly.

 

The technique is called Head Trajectory and Dubnyk discovered it while working with former NHL goalie and current MSG Network analyst Stephen Valiquette for one week at Andy O'Brien's NHL fitness camp in Vail, Colo., before the opening of training camps.

 

"It's all to do with your head. It's like closing on pucks," Dubnyk told NHL.com. "You discover you have to move a whole lot less than you used to feel you need to. It's such small movements forward and just closing off the angle of the puck, and when you start to realize that and you realize how big you are when you put yourself in the right position -- and that's a big part of it -- you start to feel comfortable and then you can be patient on your feet. You can sit there and let plays happen in front of you and not be going down early, and everything kind of comes with it once you realize how big you are."

 

Actually, making saves is just one part of Head Trajectory, which at its simplest is about how you track pucks with your head rather than just following it with your eyes. The concept applies to every part of goaltending, from how a goalie moves around the ice following the play, to how he recovers and moves after a save.

 

Valiquette learned Head Trajectory from its developer, Lyle Mast, who founded OR (Optimum Reaction) Sports, and consults with numerous goalies and coaches at all levels, including the Tri-City Americans in the Western Hockey League. Mast has worked on its development since 2008 with Los Angeles Kings goaltending coach Bill Ranford, who uses a core portion of it with the Kings goaltenders.

 

The beauty of Head Trajectory is twofold: how it applies to any goaltending style and its simplicity. It focuses on the manner in which you move your head to stay focused on pucks while tracking plays and shots, rather than looking left or right or over the shoulder and pulling your eyes off the puck. As simple as it sounds, the applications, like the 13 years of research that went into developing it, are more detailed and comprehensive.

 

"It's the way we move our head to track the puck all the time," Valiquette said. "And really it's a foundation that touches all parts of how we play the position. It's that valuable. Working with goalies on this, if they can understand it and apply it, it's the biggest game-changer we are going to see in goaltending, maybe ever. Maybe this is bigger than the butterfly. It will revolutionize and evolve goaltending."

 

I'll bet there is waiting line to the "Lyle Mast" school for goaltenders.  

[OccamsRazor]

The Minnesota Wild’s Goaltender Crisis

 

http://thehockeywriters.com/the-minnesota-wilds-goaltender-crisis/

[radoran]

It is just mindblowing to me that a player like Dubnyk can bounce around to five teams in 12 months and be the most critical player to a teams success of any player on his team, possibly in the entire league.

 

Mindblowing?

 

Ilya Bryzgalov was 7-1-3, 2.12, .911 for the Wild last year down the stretch.

 

He was bought out of his contract with the Flyers, signed a tryout in the ECHL, played with the Oilers' AHL squad and traded starts with Dubnyk (go figure) in Edmonton before being dealt to Minny in the same year. The WIld squeaked in as the 7th seed in the West.

 

The question is: can Dubnyk do better than Bryz's 3-6, 2.63, .885 in the playoffs?

 

Remains to be seen.