Lundqvist is roaring back

[HaNotsri]

Same procedure as last year?
Same procedure as every year.

 

[Leonardo87]

Lundqvist doing this with inconsistent D also. Imagine with better D? Well can only imagine.

Anyway, Need to Un-Jinx this thread...

Lundqvist sucks, D has bailed him out, he needs to be traded for a bag of pucks.

 

[EdJovanovski]

Best goalie of this generation

 

[LeetchisGod]

Sure was an amazing goalie battle last night, Hank looked great.

Howard is a beast at MSG.

 

[haak84]

lets not get crazy now. he had a good november last season. brodeur had a great november the year before retirement. hes older and needs to be this consistent for more than a month or two.

 

[Pavel Buchnevich]

He's been so much better, playing incredibly well. This doesn't look fluky, either.

Will he continue it? I don't know, I think there's a chance. Last two seasons when he would have a good stretch, I considered it a fluke, and thats because he might've had some good stats at times, but he wasn't playing all that well.

The past few weeks he's been excellent, he's playing as well as he has at any point in his career.

 

[RoyalDuder]

Aaaaaand he was pulled against the lowly Panthers

 

[Cashville]

Happy for him, despite tonight's game.

New York should build a statue of him when he retires; I firmly believe he has contributed more to the Rangers over the last ~12 years than any other player on any other team. The period includes some pretty prolific competing single-team contributors (e.g. Jumbo Joe in SJ). The "no cup tho!" crowd will grumble and shake their fists, but he has defined the modern NYR era for me.

 

[torirose1998]

Happy for him, despite tonight's game.

New York should build a statue of him when he retires; I firmly believe he has contributed more to the Rangers over the last ~12 years than any other player on any other team. The period includes some pretty prolific competing single-team contributors (e.g. Jumbo Joe in SJ). The "no cup tho!" crowd will grumble and shake their fists, but he has defined the modern NYR era for me.

I totally agree

 

[bob27]

Doesn't he roar back around December every year?

 

[PatrikBerglund]

Ranger's atrociously bad team defence is only rivaled by Buffalo.

 

[pheasant]

Can we just have a dedicated 'roaring back' thread, please? I'd like to nominate Gaborik and Eriksson.

 

[Yggdrasil]

AV has helped this team overachieve since he arrived. He did not deserve to be fired.

got in the finals...almost, how quickly impatient some of those people here turn their team.

he just needs to be less stubborn.

 

[Glen Sathers Cigar]

He never left. Bad year? Yes.

He had a bad year [and still posted a .927SV% in playoffs and outplayed Price].

Bad years happen. What I dont get is how goaltenders like Rinne can have 2-3 off years and are still considered elite [nothing against Rinne, but somehow a double standard against Henrik].

He literally had a .920SV%+ as a starter 7 or 8 years in a row before he had his bad season. The Rangers are also a poor defensive team who often give up better/more numerous chances.

He is still a strong starting goaltender, and his numbers would be better on a better defensive team.

He was elite for 10 straight years. Lundqvist went 9 straight seasons to start his career finishing at least 6th or better in Vezina voting, finalist 5 times and winning 1.

Basically he was the standard for elite goaltending at a for a decade that was at a level of consistency unmatched by his peers. His first bad season came at 35 so naturally people assumed it was age related and he was on the downturn. He is definitely on the back nine of his career, but it's not going to be the drop off a cliff that people expected after last season. I think he'll be a .914-.918 guy for the next few seasons and still have his fastball for when the playoffs come around. He just needed to adjust his game a little bit to compensate for his slowing down.

Either way, he looks much closer to vintage Lundqvist than he does the goalie he was last year. Last year, even in his good games, he was constantly scrambling and losing his net and always seemed to be fighting the puck andnot tracking as well as he always had. This season his form is tight, his positioning is good and he looks like he's put last year behind him. Night and day compared to last year.

Ranger's atrociously bad team defence is only rivaled by Buffalo.

It really is putrid. Av's man to man system just doesn't do defensemen any favors out there. Lundqvist has faced the most high danger scoring chances in the league.

AV has some good ideas as a coach and his system for offense with the quick strike counter attack mindset is great, but he really needs an elite goalie for his system to function. AV should thank whoever he believes in every single night before going to sleep that the two starting goalies he's had for most of his career are the best goalie of his generation (Lundqvist) and the second best goalie of that generation (Luongo).

 

[Irishguy42]

Doesn't he roar back around December every year?

Historically (and statistically proven), he has always had a shitty October (except for two or so years ago), and then climbed his way back to being good/great near the end of the calendar year and then hovers around that until the end of the season.

So, yeah, he's right on schedule.