The season isn’t even a month old and Thatcher Demko already has two clear-cut candidates for save of the year.
First, there was Demko’s incredible blockerless scorpion kick save on Artemi Panarin in the Vancouver Canucks’ wild 3-2 win over the New York Rangers. It shouldn’t just be considered a candidate for save of the year — it’s arguably one of the greatest saves ever.
Then, on Sunday night against the Dallas Stars, Demko added another ridiculous save to his resumé: a diving stick save that absolutely robbed Jamie Benn of what looked like a sure goal. It was such an absurd save that even Canucks commentators John Shorthouse and John Garrett thought it hit the post on the television broadcast but slow-motion replays prove that Demko did, in fact, get his stick on the puck.
Those are the types of saves that can be described as Hasekian after Hall of Fame goaltender Dominik Hasek. In fact, we could say that Demko has BDE: Big Dominik Energy.
"It looks like he’s just flailing around, but it’s calculated."
In an interview with The Athletic this offseason, Demko called Hasek the greatest goalie of all time in his book and said that if he could take one attribute from any other goalie it would be either Martin Brodeur’s mental game or “Hasek’s competitive nature.”
“I mean, everyone is competitive. Dominik though, he had a spatial awareness that I don’t think — maybe Andrei Vasilevskiy a little bit now — but he was the only guy that had that sort of awareness of his body in the net,” said Demko to The Athletic. “You see so many saves where it’s just his arm, but his arm is going into a strategic spot. It looks like he’s just flailing around, but it’s calculated.”
Like so many of Hasek’s incredible saves, Demko’s two save-of-the-year candidates were calculated. Demko didn’t stick his leg up in the air like a scorpion’s tail out of pure desperation but because he had lost his blocker and had no other way to stop an elevated shot. He didn’t just dive across with his stick out and hope but instead put his stick in a “strategic spot” to make the save.
That’s BDE.
“I mean sometimes you’re just throwing something out, but for him, he always knew where the puck was and he knows middle net is strong,” said Demko of Hasek. “Most pucks are going to come back to middle or most pucks are going to be in a certain spot, in a certain scramble. He was just really, really intelligent.”
It’s that competitiveness and creativity that Demko shares with Hasek that Canucks goaltending coach Ian Clark truly prizes the most in a goaltender.
“I say this, and I probably shouldn’t, but I say that we can teach a goaltender technique in a weekend,” said Clark to CanucksArmy. “So for me, those things really don’t register for me when I’m evaluating a goalie. What I’m really looking at is the intangible things that I know through my history in the game are much more difficult to teach through nurture.”
In other words, someone can learn the right technique and, in combination with top-tier athleticism, become a good goaltender. The thing that takes a goaltender from good to great is that ability to go beyond pure technique and find a way to make a save when everything else breaks down.
“The ability to break from structure to find a creative, smooth solution in a difficult moment,” said Clark. “You can’t just always count on technique to carry the day when the game is so dynamic, so unpredictable. The elite goalies all have the ability to find creative solutions in difficult and challenging moments.”
That description fits Demko to a T.
Let down by the Canucks' penalty kill
All season, Demko has been making fantastic saves to give the Canucks a chances to win, even if the Canucks haven’t taken advantage of enough of those opportunities. Unfortunately, he’s also been let down by a lacklustre penalty kill that has allowed too many cross-seam passes and backdoor plays that are nigh-impossible to stop.
As a result, the gap between Demko’s save percentage at 5-on-5 and while shorthanded is extreme.
Demko has a .918 save percentage in all situations, which ranks 19th among the 40 NHL goaltenders with at least five games played. That’s startlingly average for a goaltender who has looked as good as Demko has.
Separate that out into different situations and it becomes clear what’s gone wrong. At 5-on-5, Demko has been outstanding, with a .941 save percentage that ranks among the best in the NHL.
Shorthanded, however, Demko has an .814 save percentage that ranks 31st in the NHL. From watching the games, it’s impossible to pin that number on Demko. Too often, the penalty kill has been picked apart to give opposing power plays fantastic scoring chances.
Turning to more advanced metrics, Demko looks even better. Natural Stat Trick’s goals saved above average (GSAA) has Demko at 7th in the NHL with 4.17 GSAA at 5-on-5, while Evolving Hockey’s goals saved above expected (GSAx) has Demko at 5th in the NHL at 5-on-5 with a 6.23 GSAx.
In some ways, the Canucks have been a significantly improved team defensively compared to last season. They’ve surrendered 5-on-5 shot attempts at the tenth-lowest rate in the NHL so far this season — a massive change from last season when they gave up the most shot attempts in the league.
In other ways, the Canucks’ defence is as bad as ever, leaking dangerous chances against: odd-man rushes, breakaways, and broken down defensive plays. Last season, they allowed 11.77 high-danger chances against per 60 minutes at 5-on-5; this season, they’ve allowed 11.01, barely an improvement at all.
In other words, the Canucks may be allowing fewer shot attempts than last season but they’re allowing about the same number of high-danger chances.
Look at this heat map of unblocked shots against that Demko has faced this season. In several areas of the ice, the Canucks have allowed a below-average number of shots. Unfortunately, the area where they’ve given up a massively above-average number of shots is the most dangerous area of the ice: the slot.
To put an exclamation point on how good Demko has been against dangerous chances, consider that he’s faced 14 shots while the Canucks have been on the power play — the most of any NHL goaltender — including 4 of what Natural Stat Trick considers high danger chances. Those are shots that are pretty much guaranteed to be breakaways and odd-man rushes off of turnovers by the power play.
Demko has stopped them all.
Demko has some serious competition this season
Between his incredible Hasekian saves and his outstanding 5-on-5 numbers while facing dangerous scoring chances, there’s a strong argument to make that Demko is the best goaltender in the NHL right now. There’s just one obstacle: other goaltenders.
Demko isn’t the only goaltender in his mid-20’s taking over the NHL. Ilya Sorokin, Igor Shesterkin, and Elvis Merzlikins have all been outstanding this season for their respective teams, making saves nearly as incredible as Demko’s.
Sergei Bobrovsky has found his game again in Florida with an absurd .948 save percentage for the undefeated Panthers. James Reimer is making the San Jose Sharks look like an actual playoff contender with a ridiculous .946 save percentage. Jacob Markstrom has 4 shutouts in 9 starts for the Calgary Flames and is third with a .942 save percentage and leads the NHL with a .961 save percentage at 5-on-5.
As good as Demko has been, these six goaltenders have been just as good. And that’s barely scratching the surface of goaltenders excelling this season. Frederik Andersen, Tristan Jarry, Jack Campbell, and Juuse Saros have all played well. Jonathan Quick looks revitalized for the Los Angeles Kings. Even Carter Hart, who looked so shaky in the Canucks’ visit to Philadelphia, has been fantastic for the Flyers this season.
In order for Demko to be in contention for the Vezina as the NHL’s top goaltender, he’s going to have to continue playing at this level all season long. Even that won’t be enough: the Canucks will have to clean up their penalty kill to prevent those goals from sewering his save percentage.
