Isn't this situation basically exactly what happened to Richard Bachman?
He came in against the Wild earlier in the season while we had various injuries and got completely hung out to dry and lit up 5-1?
No. Why? Because Richard Bachman is a 31 year old professional that has been a NHL backup to 4th string goaltender for damn near a decade. They may have hung him out to dry but the situation wasn't nearly the same.
...It sucks to have this happen to a young prospect, but I find myself doubting the results would be different with a rent a goalie. Even with healthy Marky in still seems very likely we lose this game.
Again...not about the two points or if they would have done better. It's about this being yet another situation that clearly demonstrates the incompetence of management. 5 weeks to get another goaltneder under an NHL contract. He's had a week since Demko was hurt to really make sure he did it. Instead nothing and it's laughable people are pretending it's hard to find what amounts to a warm body that has at least some NHL ability.
Arguing that we should have a rent-a-goalie instead of a kid still in the CHL has merit... but on the flipside this is what DiPietro will have to struggle through anyways if he ever makes it to the NHL. If he goes 5-10 NHL games losing 7-2 or similar, then we have a problem.
But this was just a joke of a night with an unfunny punchline.
There is a difference to struggling through bad games or a slump at a level you are qualified to play in and being thrown to the wolves at a level you aren't remotely qualified for. I'm not saying this hurts his long term development but he also doesn't really learn anything. The most he learned is that he needs to improve every single area of his game by massive leaps and bounds to be ready for the NHL. He already knew that.
In my 35+ years of watching NHL hockey I can not recall a time where I saw:
(a) a team clearly let up on an opposition goaltender (except for all star games) and
(b) opposition players actually express feeling sorry he was in that situation after the game.
But as someone said last night...you can put the bar on the floor and Benning will still manage to get under that bar and disappoint. And even worse still have people actually defend it when even the canucks media shills were at a loss for words.