darren wrote:Nuckertuzzi wrote: He may eventually get over the hump here but he's had six years, five opportunities and failed miserably in most of them.
I'd point out that in every one of those "miserable failures", there have been two teams on the ice, and in every case but one*, that other team has gone on to win the Stanley Cup that year.
I know this horse has been beaten to death, but when you score 8 goals in 7 games, that's a miserable failure alright, but not by your goaltending. (even when Lou was getting shutouts we were only scoring 1 goal, so I have no time for the "lou sucked so bad that he made the team suck" argument). To win the cup, you have to be good, and you have to be lucky with injuries. That's just how it is. The Bruins were a lot luckier with injuries than we were in 2011 and they won. The 2012 Kings were a lot better team on the ice than they were on paper, and they were damn lucky with injuries all the way through, and they won. The 2010 Hawks were simply better and deeper than we were, as were the 2007 Ducks.
*(I think that 2009 against the Hawks is the one time that I would really hang it on Lou... the rest of the time we got beat by a better/healthier team).
2007 - Lu was outstanding despite the overtime blunder. The team was completely inept offensively. We had no chance, I loved his performance...no problem there.
2009 - The Hawks were deeper but that was the year I felt we really could've done something as we had some serious depth ourselves. Unfortnately that was the year when Lu's meltdowns began. Game 6 against the Hawks was an absolute killer because the team fought so hard to stay alive and the Twins and Sundin really came to life but Lu couldn't stop a puck to save his life. It was one deflating goal after another and at the worst possible times. Inexcusable when you supposedly have the better goaltender in the series.
2010 - The Hawks were an even better and deeper team and our defense was in shambles so I'll grant you that..but that's when you hope to get a spark from your goaltending and instead you get the opposite as he was equally as bad in this series as the season prior.
2011 - Third series in a row against a Hawks team where we should've had the goaltending advantage and didn't. Yet Lu managed to find a way get out of the series with a stellar Game 7...deserves praise for that but it was his horrible games in between that got us to that point.
The 8 goal Boston series argument is valid but people forget the fact that one of the biggest reasons we couldn't score is because the other goalie was doing to us exactly what I've been trying to say about what Lu should be doing more frequently to others. So what if he shuts out three games if you can't stop a beach ball in the other four...you need to win four games, right?
2012 - Lu was ok, couldn't be blamed but a few more stops could've helped. What I'd like to point out most about last years playoffs is what was the main reason the Kings won the Cup? Outstanding, reliable goaltending. Quick had a couple of so so games but recovered nicely and never let anything escalate to meltdowns. While he was simply out of this world it's proven you don't need that level of backstopping to win a Cup. But you have no chance if you get performances as volatile as Lu's. If we had just gotten one consistently good year out of him close to what Quick did, something he should be more than capable of, do you think we would still be Cupless right now with the teams we've had?
season prior.