| Friday, November 3
By Rob Parent
Special to ESPN.com |
|
So now that they finally got a few of their nightly 45 shots or so past
the skinny goalie of their nightmares -- and no, we're not talking about
Dominik Hasek -- the Philadelphia Flyers speak in glowing terms of confidence.
And the fallacies thereof.
"He's a confidence goalie," Flyers defenseman Luke Richardson said of
always diminutive and recently dynamic Ron Tugnutt, a teammate from their
junior hockey days in Peterborough and one season with the Edmonton Oilers.
"When we get a couple to sneak in on him ... he'll get down on himself. You
can see it in his face and his body actions."
|  | | Despite losing Game 3, goalie Ron Tugnutt has been on top of his game for the Penguins. |
So, in Game 4 on Thursday night, the Flyers expect Tugnutt to bend
if not break, wilt if not whither. They view holding down
Jaromir Jagr as the key to evening the series. What they don't see is how a nearly
career-long little guy can keep holding them off the board like Tugnutt did
in the first two games of the series, and almost did in a 40-save outing in a
4-3 overtime Flyers win in Game 3.
But there can be no misreading the way this series is shaping up -- the
best player in the world dominating games offensively; the little goalie who
never could winning games in goal. At age 32, this is Ron Tugnutt's time to
stand up and be counted.
"I don't think I'm any different from any other athlete," said Tugnutt.
"If you have confidence, you will play well."
He played well enough down the stretch for the Penguins to secure the
seventh playoff seed in the East. He played well enough in the opening round
series with Washington for people to take notice, especially a Capitals team
which had been the NHL's best in the second half of the season. And he played
well enough in two road victories in Philadelphia for the Penguins to now be
talking about another Stanley Cup.
Even with this new little goalie who they're just getting to know.
"Yeah," said Jagr, "you know, he's not a bad goalie, is he? I thought he
was going to be a backup."
So did the Flyers, who considered Tugnutt the personification of a
postseason respite after having had to face -- and defeat -- Hasek and the
Sabres in the first round. Most of their pre-series chatter was focused on
Jagr, and really, why shouldn't it have been?
The control with which he's had in this series has the Pittsburgh pundits
comparing him to the way Mario Lemieux played in the twin runs to the Cup in
1991 and '92.
|
“ |
Yeah, you know,
he's not a bad goalie, is he? I thought he was going to be a backup. ” |
|
|
— Jaromir Jagr |
"We've got to do a better job on him," Philadelphia's Keith Jones said
after Jagr had scored twice and set up the other Pens goal in Game 3.
"He's unbelievable."
According to the groin-sore, flu-ridden Jagr, he's, "skating maybe 60 or
70 percent."
How's that grab your stomachs, Flyers?
As for grabbing pucks, Tugnutt's been doing that so well that even if the
Flyers find some sick way of getting Jagr out of their hair, they're still
going to have a major problem scoring enough goals to pull this series out.
For there is more to the way Tugnutt is playing than just a prolonged sense
of confidence.
"If you look at any goalie, any player, I have yet to see any good player
without confidence," said Tugnutt. "And I have yet to see any good goalie
without confidence. When your confidence is struggling, you can tell you are
struggling on the ice. And when confidence is running high, you can see it
out there."
So far in the postseason, Tugnutt, the journeyman goalie acquired from
Ottawa with the intention of making him the Penguins' backup to young
Jean-Sebastien Aubin, has been extraordinary.
In Pittsburgh's whitewash of Washington, Tugnutt stopped 152 of
Washington's 160 shots. In the Penguins' two wins in Philadelphia which has
given them a stranglehold on this second-round series, Tugnutt stopped 72 of
73 shots. He's been a discovery. A gem in the rough. And even if he was
roughed up for four goals in Game 3, he still managed to make 40 saves.
No looks of fear or acts of contortion were noticeable.
"I'm more relaxed here in general," Tugnutt said. "The easiest part for me
is putting on the equipment and going out to play."
Since entering the NHL, success has never come easy to Tugnutt.
A fourth draft pick of Quebec's in 1986, he bounced back and forth to the
minors for a couple of years and never won a regular role with the Nordiques.
He was finally traded to Edmonton in 1992, where again he was relegated to
backup status, and was left unprotected for expansion Anaheim to acquire him
a year later.
Losing a battle to Guy Hebert there, Tugnutt was promptly traded to
Montreal, where he'd play a total of 15 games for parts of two seasons until
being let go. He signed as a free agent with Washington in 1995, but spent
that entire 1995-96 season with Portland of the AHL. It was there that he
seemed to get his game together, and when Ottawa signed him as a free agent
in Aug. 1996, Tugnutt finally got a chance to prove himself.
In three very solid seasons with the Senators, splitting duty with Damian
Rhodes, he posted 54 wins and three straight descending GAAs of 2.80, 2.25
and 1.79. He also did nothing to improve Ottawa's playoff fortunes. It was
for this reason that first-year GM Marshall Johnston decided his
on-the-cusp Senators needed something more for this year's playoff drive, so
he sent Tugnutt and defenseman Janne Laukkanen to Pittsburgh in exchange for
proven playoff veteran and two-time Cup winner Tom Barrasso.
Tugnutt, who had just bought a house in the Ottawa area, was taken
completely by surprise. But rather than be embittered, he channeled his anger.
Six weeks later, Tugnutt is standing tall in Pittsburgh, Barrasso is
contemplating his own free agent options and Johnston is a GM with a problem.
"I have nothing but the utmost respect for Marshall Johnston and everybody
there (in Ottawa), but you want to prove yourself," said Tugnutt. "It gave me
a little chip on my shoulder. I wanted to prove some people wrong. I mean, I
felt pretty good through the whole Washington series, but that chip was there
the whole time."
Instead of being able to take it out on the Senators, Tugnutt has settled
for the two top seeds in the East. So far ... pretty good, you know?
"I think we're a pretty confident group now," said Tugnutt, whose career
postseason record was 3-8 before this little run of his. "I think we feel
good about the way we're playing. We're just letting the game start and
letting the game finish."
Tugnutt has not only inspired more confidence in his new teammates, he's
also drawn more than a fair share of praise from the Flyers.
"He's an angles goaltender," struggling Flyers center Keith Primeau said
of Tugnutt. "He's not a big guy, but he's doing a great job with his angles
right now. His defense is doing a great job in front of the net, helping him
out ... I've seen Ronnie play for a long time, but who would have thought
that we'd have an easier time with Dominik (Hasek) than with Ronnie?"
"You guys correct me if I'm wrong," Rick Tocchet had said after the
Flyers' loss in Game 2, "but even on (Simon) Gagne's rebound goal, (Andy)
Delmore's shot before that hit a defenseman and (Tugnutt) still stopped it.
We're all like, 'Oh, my God, that was a great save.' It was a deflection and
it went off his pad. But after it got to 3-1, we had that power play and still
had a lot of good chances, and couldn't get it by him. He's in our heads
right now."
He won't apologize for that, but the diminutive, unassuming Tugnutt says
he's not doing anything special right now. He's also not worrying about
finally having given up a four goals in a game for the first time in these
playoffs.
"I'm just going out there and I have nothing to worry about," said
Tugnutt. "I just throw the equipment on and play. I have no outside
distractions. My mind is strictly on what we're doing here."
And since he's doing exactly what he never did before in prior stops with
four other NHL teams?
"Oh yeah," Tugnutt said, "I'm having a lot of fun right now."
Thanks, Marshall.
Quote of the week
"It was the year I was born. I thought they were chanting Happy
Birthday or something." -- Toronto winger Garry Valk, after hearing a "67"
chant in the Meadowlands in the third period of New Jersey's 5-1 victory. The
chant -- reminiscent of the 1940 Rangers song that played so well there -- was
reminding the Leafs of the last year in which they won a Stanley Cup.
Rob Parent covers the NHL for the Delaware County (Pa.) Times. His NHL East column appears every week on ESPN.com. |  |
