Wednesday night’s game between the Vegas Golden Knights and Washington Capitals featured something you don’t see very often.
No, not just 36-year-old Alex Ovechkin reaching the 50-goal plateau, but Vegas head coach Pete DeBoer opting to pull Robin Lehner in a game that was tied at 1-1.
Matt Larkin and Mike McKenna talked about the pull on Thursday’s edition of The Daily Faceoff Show.
Larkin: “Vegas beat the Capitals by a score of 3-2 in overtime. Robin Lehner was pulled after the first period in which he allowed one goal on 13 shots.
"Pete DeBoer told reporter Jesse Granger from The Athletic after the game that Lehner was healthy, the team pays him to start these kinds of games, and the team was rattled. To me, it doesn’t make sense. Washington scored 6:18 into the game and Vegas tied it seven minutes later. How was this team rattled at the intermission?
"Tell me what’s going on here. Something’s fishy.”
McKenna: “I’m just surprised. I’ve never seen a goalie pulled after allowing one goal on 13 shots in the first period of a tie game. That’s never happened before to me, I’ve never seen it.
"The closest I’ve seen was when I was playing in the AHL and Curtis McElhinney allowed two goals pretty quickly, one in the first and one in the second, and I got thrown in by Ryan McGill, who, ironically, is the assistant coach of the Golden Knights now.
"This was just odd. Last night, the first goal didn’t look good on Robin Lehner. It was a screen-shot that went under his pads and he’s looking around and it’s not a confident moment for that club.
"But my question is why did DeBoer even start him? If he already had doubts about him and was looking to pull him this quickly, I’d like to know what was said between them in the locker room. I can’t imagine the reaction. If I was in Robin’s shoes there, that would have just blown me away.
"Especially coming back after losing to New Jersey recently. Lehner allowed a tough goal or two in that game and DeBoer said ‘Hey, I want to give him a chance to redeem himself.’ Well, I don’t think Robin had that chance. I think it was one goal and that was it.
"I’m not sure what happened. Logan Thompson came in and did a great job and the Golden Knights ended up getting a win. DeBoer, by all means, it looks like it was a good decision in giving some juice to his club. It just surprised me. I haven’t seen anything like it before.”
Larkin: “I wonder if this is a case of selling out to win now but you’re going to hurt yourself later. After this, if you’re Robin Lehner, let’s say you make the playoffs and you start Game 1, you allow one goal on 10 shots in the first period, are you looking over your shoulder and worrying about getting pulled?”
McKenna: “I don’t even know where it goes from here. If I’m Robin Lehner I’m probably burning up inside that I was supposedly given a chance but wasn’t allowed to finish it out. I don’t know where it goes.
"Thompson has played really well, Lehner has had a tough time with injuries all year but has had flashes where he’s good. If they’re playing Lehner to win these games but they’re going to Thompson. This is just a lot of drama towards the end of the season and Vegas still needs to win some games to make the playoffs.”
You can watch the full episode here…
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