DALLAS — If Logan Thompson leads the Vegas Golden Knights onto the ice for Game 1 against the Dallas Stars on Monday evening, it will be his first time doing it in the playoffs.
Thompson is a relatively experienced NHL goalie. He’s played in more than 100 games over the last three seasons. He’s even played in an All-Star Game, but Monday night’s postseason debut would be his biggest stage yet.
Advertisem*nt
It wouldn’t be easy, facing the Stars’ high-powered offense, which scored the third-most goals in the NHL, but Thompson has a knack for raising his game when it’s needed most. It’s a trait many of the goalies in Vegas seem to share, and have shown over the franchise’s brief history.
Marc-Andre Fleury’s heroics are well-documented. He led the expansion team to the Cup Final in 2018 and won the Vezina Trophy in 2021, but even since moving on from the future Hall of Famer, Vegas has gotten excellent goaltending from less-heralded netminders.
The Golden Knights have finished in the bottom half of the league in overall save percentage only twice in seven seasons. The combined .906 save percentage since 2017-18 is eighth-best in the NHL since Vegas entered the league.
At the start of the 2022-23 season, when presumed starter Robin Lehner was ruled out for the season after undergoing surgery on both hips, the weight of the starting role fell onto the shoulders of Thompson, an undrafted player who is one of very few to make it to the NHL from Canadian university hockey.
Thompson didn’t even have 20 career NHL starts at the time. He carried a cap hit below the league’s minimum salary ($766,667), but certainly didn’t play like it. The Calgary native helped Vegas to a 14-3-0 start, and ended up representing the Golden Knights in the All-Star Game in Florida. A position filled with question marks entering the season was suddenly a strength.
Thompson was plagued by injuries in the second half of that season, playing in only two games after the All-Star break. With backup Adin Hill also battling injuries late in the season, Vegas turned to Laurent Brossoit, who had never started in the playoffs but performed brilliantly. Brossoit outdueled Winnipeg’s Connor Hellebuyck in the opening round of the playoffs, stopping .915 percent of the shots he faced to eliminate his former team.
Advertisem*nt
In the middle of the second round, Brossoit went down with an injury and Vegas once again was forced to turn to a goalie with no prior postseason experience.
Hill took the crease and never looked back. He won 11 of his 15 starts, producing an incredible .932 save percentage and two shutouts in the conference finals to backstop the Golden Knights to the Stanley Cup.
All of that is to say that Vegas’ goalies have regularly stepped up when called upon in big spots. How have they done it? There’s plenty of credit to go around.
First, general manager Kelly McCrimmon and president of hockey operations George McPhee have identified good values at the position. McCrimmon coached Thompson during his junior hockey days with the Brandon Wheat Kings, and brought him in as an AHL goalie in the summer of 2020. He went on to win the Baz Bastien Memorial Award for the AHL’s goalie of the year, and quickly graduated to the NHL.
Vegas acquired Hill in a trade from San Jose ahead of the 2022-23 season. He has all of the physical tools and had shown promise in Arizona and San Jose, but injuries and inconsistency kept him from taking the No. 1 job at either stop. The Golden Knights saw the potential and took a low-risk chance on him that worked out for both sides.
Goalie coach Sean Burke deserves his share of credit. The 18-year NHL veteran with more than 800 starts himself has gotten the most out of every goalie who has come through Vegas over the last two seasons.
Hill and Thompson have both exceeded expectations, as did rookie Jiri Patera — who has started seven games in spot-duty — and veteran Jonathan Quick – who came over at last year’s deadline and contributed several wins down the stretch.
“He’s got a good relationship with those guys,” head coach Bruce Cassidy said of Burke. “He’s kind of blended their styles with how he feels the best way to play is, and how that integrates with how we’re playing as a D-core in front of them.”
The style of hockey that Cassidy has the Golden Knights playing also deserves some credit for the excellent goaltending metrics. Cassidy’s zone scheme protects the slot as well as any defensive coverage in the sport, forcing opponents to take more predictable shots from further out. That, combined with the excellent defensive players on Vegas’ roster, makes things easier on whichever goalie is in net.
“There are a lot of bodies in front of them, so goalies have to get used to that,” Cassidy said of the style of play. “There aren’t as many bang-bang plays in the slot, so they understand the high-danger (chances) should be on odd-man rushes, a breakdown, a breakaway or a two-on-one.
“(Burke) has done a terrific job for us. Both goalies are progressing well. Like our team they’ve had ups and downs this year, but I think our goaltending is sometimes a reflection of how we’re playing.”
Finally, the goalies themselves deserve the bulk of the credit. Hill stood on his head when needed during last year’s Cup run. Early in this season, he was leading the league in save percentage, but suffered several injuries and hasn’t played at the same level since.
In his absence, with the team dropping dangerously close to falling out of playoff position in March, Thompson elevated his game and helped carry the team to its sixth postseason appearance in seven years.
“Last year I felt we turned the page at the All-Star break,” McCrimmon said Saturday. “This year, I felt we turned the page after the trade deadline, and certainly that’s true of Logan. That, for me, is when Logan has played his best hockey. He had the opportunity to be in the net, and his play has earned him the right to stay in the net. So good on him.”
Thompson went 8-2-0 after the trade deadline with the second-highest save percentage in the league (.926) during that span.
Advertisem*nt
“I’m just trying to be more inside my posts and in control,” Thompson said. “I think that’s how I’ve felt lately. I’m not really getting out of position too much, and just getting in the way of the pucks.”
Thompson is an athletic goalie with incredibly quick feet. He uses that to cover the bottom of the net well, but it can also lead to over-activity in the crease. When he moves around too much, it can open up holes, but over the second half of the season, he’s been much more under control, played deeper in his crease, and the results have been strong.
“I think it’s a depth thing,” he explained. “It’s also a confidence thing. You don’t always need to be out of your blue paint. I think the biggest difference in the NHL is just learning how to play a little deeper. Guys can make plays, so it just gives you an extra half second to read a puck.”
“I just think he’s on right now,” Cassidy said of Thompson. “He seems to be square to a lot of pucks. He’s engaged mentally into the game. You can see that in his puck play.”
Of all of Thompson’s strengths, perhaps his best trait is his competitiveness. He maximizes his athleticism in net by never giving up on a puck. When Hill went down, he seized the opportunity by playing some of the best hockey of his career.
“I feel that it’s probably because Logan wants to play some playoff hockey,” Cassidy said. “He saw what Hill and Brossoit did last year and would like to be that guy, too. He’s a competitive guy that wants to get in there.”
Now the Golden Knights find themselves in a familiar situation, leaning on a goalie with no prior playoff experience and needing him to perform. Cassidy still hasn’t announced a Game 1 starter or what the rotation might look like in net, but there’s a good chance Thompson will be involved.
“I don’t know how that’s going to play out, to be honest,” Cassidy said on Wednesday. “Logan has had a good stretch of games, so I think his mindset is good going into the playoffs. He hasn’t played playoff hockey, so that’s another animal. To say, ‘OK, Logan, you’re going to be the guy,’ and he’s never played. Is that fair to him, especially after what Hill did last year?
Advertisem*nt
“If we just give it to Hill and say, ‘Have at it,’ well, Logan has played pretty well recently, and played more because he’s been healthy. So is that the right way to go? You’re probably, in some way shape or form, going to see both guys. That’s not because of poor play, either. That just might be the best way to go for where they’re both at right now, and how their seasons have gone.”
The Stars are a formidable opponent with exceptional scoring depth. Dallas had nine different players reach the 50-point mark this season (compared to only five for Vegas). Jake Oettinger will start in net for the Stars. The 25-year-old already has a top-five finish in Vezina Trophy voting under his belt and he found his rhythm late in the season.
The Golden Knights will need their goalie (whomever it is) to once again exceed expectations to make it out of this first-round battle between two of the heavyweights of the West. Luckily for them, there’s plenty of history of their goalies doing just that.
(Photo of Adin Hill and Logan Thompson: Ethan Miller / Getty Images)
