The Demko Dilemma – Unlucky or Predictable?

A Historical Context to Try and Protect our Netminders in an Ever-Adapting Landscape

By Austin V

The Game: From Vezina Preview to Massive Long-Term Concern

On the morning of March 10, 2024, the air in Vancouver was tense. The city was elated that the hometown Canucks dismantled the surging Winnipeg Jets the previous night in what was arguably their most complete game of the entire season. Canucks fans had this game circled on the calendar for months in anticipation of the face off between two of the pinnacles of modern NHL goaltending. Superstar Thatcher Demko had been phenomenal all year, sporting a 33-14-2 record, 2.49 GAA and a .916 save percentage, while Winnipeg netminder Connor Hellebuyck was arguably better with a 29-13-3 record, 2.29 GAA and a .922 save percentage. These were the two best goalies in the league at the time, and some of the more optimistic fans in the lower mainland believed that the winner of this game could win the Vezina Trophy, awarded annually to the goaltender considered the best at their position. This game had standings implications as well, as the two sides were jockeying to be the top ranked team in the Western Conference. The energy was palpable, and the league was ready to watch the goaltending duel of the season.

Unfortunately, the game was far less exciting than advertised. Hellebuyck struggled while Miller, Höglander, Di Giuseppe, Garland and Pettersson scored to ground the Jets in a 5-0 massacre. Ultimately, the discourse post-game surrounded Demko and his status. The San Diego, California native left the game with 13:20 left in the second period after making only 12 saves. This was his 49th game of the season, putting him among the league leaders in the stat at the time and on pace for over 60 games – a rarity in today’s NHL. Casey DeSmith came in relief to make 10 more stops, earning the third shared shutout in team history. Despite the dominant win, the city’s collective stomach was in its throat as fans worried for the health of the future Vezina finalist. 

With 17:25 left in the second, Quinn Hughes got his path crossed with Referee Furman South beside the net on an attempt to reach Nikolaj Ehlers on a dump-and-chase. This extra half-second allowed the Danish speedster to corral the puck and center it to a flying Vladislav Namestnikov, who was promptly robbed by Demko’s glove. Demko, who was sitting deep in his net with his skates on his posts, got up slowly afterwards and flexed his knee a couple times before resuming play. Four minutes later, he left for the bench. His night was done. 

This is the most likely moment when Demko injured himself, though the exact cause remains unclear. The team’s communication around the injury and Demko’s status has been muddy at best, and fan speculation has been rampant. After a failed comeback and rumours of a second return mid-Playoffs, he has only appeared in two regular season games and one playoff game since sustaining his mysterious injury. We now know that he injured his popliteus, a small muscle located in the knee. This muscle provides flexion for internal knee rotation and is a crucial part of the goaltending position due to its use in pivoting and explosive movements.

According to Demko, this type of injury has never been seen at the NHL level and fans have yet to learn whether the netminder will ever return to the level he reached last season. Canuck fans understandably have high expectations for the team after their promising season last year. Newcomer Kevin Lankinen has surpassed all expectations with his remarkable 8-1-2 start, but most know that the team needs a healthy Thatcher Demko to challenge for the Stanley Cup. As of now, the team has reported that he’s skating with the team, but there is no timeline for when he’ll be able to play again. 

The History: Stand-Up, Butterfly, Athleticism and Innovation 

To further explore why and how this may have occurred, it’s crucial to understand the historical context with goaltending styles and the evolution of goaltending demands. For more than half a century, goalies used a “Stand-Up” style where they would seldom drop to their knees; instead electing to use kick saves and stick saves to react to shots in the lower half of the net. In fact, Detroit and Chicago’s Glenn Hall was the first to use the first version of the “Butterfly” style in the mid 1950's. In this age, stick blades were completely flat and elevating the puck more than a couple inches off the ice proved near impossible to do accurately. Trailblazers like Hall would play the percentages, electing to block these shots with their bodies from their knees rather than trying to react to every shot with fast movements. They tended to be much more aggressive, significantly reducing the amount of empty space for shooters to aim for while also being in a good position to stop a rebound. This is unlike the traditional stand-up style, which was slow and often left goaltenders out of position for the next phase of play. Hall is now honoured in the Hockey Hall of Fame for his strong career numbers, but also for revolutionizing the way the goaltending position is played. 

As time went on, more and more goaltenders followed in Glenn Hall’s footsteps (or skate strides). Interestingly enough, Chicago’s Stan Mikita began the trend of curving his stick blade almost immediately after Hall’s style began increasing in popularity. Mikita got his blade caught in a door frame accidentally and jokingly used it in a 1962 practice. After seeing more success with his wrist shots, the story says he never went back. Even so, blade and stick technology took decades to refine. Despite shooters curving their own sticks with blow torches, high shots were still unpredictable due to the flawed blade angles; it was more accurate to keep shots low. Even though skaters revolutionized their equipment, it was well before its time. It was still more efficient for goalies like Hall to play the percentages than stay standing in their crease, which may not have been the case if players had mastered this skill sooner. 

This propelled the new butterfly style into the 70’s and 80’s and allowed for its relative mastery prior to further advancements in stick technology. As shooters got better at picking their spots, pads became bigger and lighter, and goalies got better at reacting to high shots. Goaltenders were able to adapt to the changing landscape in real time. Plus, lighter pads meant it was less taxing to constantly drop down and get up. More goalies adopted the butterfly and saw success with it, despite the sport of hockey undergoing a massive offensive culture shift. 

One such example is Patrick Roy. Roy dominated the league with the butterfly, revolutionizing it further as the culmination of cat-like reflexes and sound positioning. He possessed exceptionally quick glove and blocker hands to react to high shots from his knees, while blocking nearly everything else with his body. Stand-up goalies were becoming a thing of the past as the goaltending world rushed to recreate Roy’s style, which was profoundly reproducible. 

Of course, we cannot explore goaltending history without talking about the wondrous Dominik Hasek. Hasek had his own style and routinely had single-game highlight packages that rivaled the entire careers of his peers. Touted by many as the best goalie of all time, Hasek was actually quite poor at some significant goaltending traits, such as positioning. However, “The Dominator” was potentially the most athletic player in the history of the league. Somehow, some way, he’d get a piece of his body in front of the puck. It could be a skate blade or his mask sliding along the ice, but he stopped the puck with whatever he could. 

In many ways it was genius. Upon seeing an open net, players tend to aim for the middle to ensure the maximum likelihood of a goal. Obviously, there’s no point in aiming for the top corner when the face of the goal is staring you down, especially when it increases the chance you’d miss the net. That’s when Hasek would dance over from nowhere and scoop, kick or claw it out when it seemed most impossible. He preyed on the shooter's complacency in a way that was surprisingly similar to Hall in the 50’s: play the percentages by blocking the most obvious part of the net, and you’ll be able to stop shots that were previously impossible to save. 

Hasek’s flexibility was unparalleled and, in many ways, impossible to replicate with the same level of success. While a few goaltenders have been able to employ similar techniques successfully, none have come close to matching the sheer dominance that Hasek had on the sport of hockey. Most notably for Canuck fans, the aforementioned Casey DeSmith became known for his “flopping” style, which is more common in shorter goaltenders. This is due to their natural inability to block as well as their taller counterparts, making it more of a necessity rather than a stylistic choice. The closest example of dominance in this playstyle is Juuse Saros of the Nashville Predators, who has excelled since taking over the starting role from fellow Finnish countryman Pekka Rinne. However, the list after Saros is few and far between.

Thatcher Demko’s Past and a Potential Injury Link

Nowadays, the average goalie typically uses a hybrid style of the most important parts of Glenn Hall and Patrick Roy’s butterfly and Dominik Hasek's stunningly acrobatic reactions, though not to his outrageous extent. Mix in a healthy dose of size and the beaches of California, and you’re left with Thatcher Demko – the quintessential modern goaltender. 

Under the tutelage of noted goalie guru Ian Clarke, Thatcher Demko became a model of current goaltending trends, possessing elite positioning and an extraordinary ability to push off the posts from his knees to make quick and improbable saves without losing control of himself. This is exemplified by his great save on Namestnikov. 

Surprisingly, Demko didn’t always look like the superstar we now know him to be. In fact, he played the entirety of his college career with significant injuries to his hips, where his mother stated that he had bone-on-bone impingements and torn labrums on both sides. According to a report by the late Jason Botchford, Demko had “zero degrees of internal rotation in his hips” prior to undergoing bilateral hip surgery to repair the issue. Demko himself explained that his hips were not the only body parts affected, pointing to the groin and lower back as being negatively impacted by his injury. He also discussed the difficulty of dropping into the butterfly pre-surgery, suggesting that his knees were overcompensating for poor hip rotation. 

Modern Playstyle Meets Modern Injury Concern

Demko’s proficiency with post-to-post movement is important as he uses a technique called the Reverse Vertical Horizontal (RVH) stance. The easiest way to describe this is dropping into a standard butterfly and then sitting on one foot and leaning into the post. This may seem impossible to everyday folk, but it’s widely considered the best method of closing gaps by the near post when the puck is behind the net or at a sharp angle. The RVH allows goaltenders to react to cross-crease passes quickly without sacrificing space for a near post shot. However, this is still a relatively new style and significantly stretches the popliteus muscle around the outside of the compressed knee. 

Wayne Gretzky revolutionized offensive zone time in the 90’s by using the space behind the offensive net to give himself time and change the angle of attack. This space was later renamed “Gretzky’s Office,” and using it has turned into an extremely viable strategy. It is most commonly seen on powerplay opportunities, and leaves goaltenders like Demko constantly dropping into the RVH stance. This lets them explode into position to challenge a shot quickly when a dangerous pass is made.

Hip injuries are especially common in hockey goalies, as is the “just deal with it” mentality. With the NHL and associated leagues becoming better and faster, the stakes are becoming increasingly higher for young adults looking to take their career to the next level. Any length of time recovering from injury is seen as a killer of progress, and players force themselves to play through pain until injuries can be dealt with at a natural break, such as the offseason. 

With this in mind, Demko’s injury feels almost inevitable – a byproduct of the athleticism, flexibility and innovation that has become the hallmark of modern goaltending. Years of working on damaged hips, a workload among the highest in the world for his position, and a mastery of this new RVH playstyle yields a perfect storm for the first injury of its type.

Now What?

While Thatcher Demko’s situation is completely different from the rest of his peers, new injuries may be a consequence of the ever-changing goaltending landscape. Skaters have been lucky enough to use better equipment to prioritize their safety and lengthen their primes as the level of play has evolved, but netminders rely more on their natural athleticism than the actual tools they are equipped with. The increased need for flexibility leaves them vulnerable to injury, especially when making awkward acrobatic saves. Demko’s injury may be unique to him, but I fear we’re about to enter an era where we lose an unprecedented amount of goaltending durability, and all because of the current environment our goalies live and work in. 

If fans are ever going to see extended dominance like we saw with Glenn Hall, Patrick Roy or Dominik Hasek, goaltenders are going to have to change their styles to allow them to perform well longer, especially if they’ve been injured in the past. The downside of this is that goaltending is such a precise position, letting in just three more shots out of one hundred would make even Connor Hellebuyck unplayable at the NHL level, bringing his Vezina-winning save percentage last year from a .920 to a .890. It seems impossible to justify a less efficient technique if it’s not even good enough to make the NHL, further enforcing habits that harm a goalie's long term health.

For the first time ever, goaltenders that started playing in the early 2000’s onwards have grown up with only this hybrid style. Kids are modeling themselves after their favourite netminder all the way down to the most subtle techniques, and some youth coaches are even teaching their netminders how to use physically taxing techniques like the RVH. The margins are so thin at all levels that goalies are sacrificing their bodies as children to make the extra save, and we may be starting to see those effects with our current superstars becoming more prone to hip, knee, core and groin related injuries. It appears that the days of goaltenders dominating for a dozen years may be fleeting, and sadly it seems predictable as to why. Now, a drastic question remains with no obvious answer: 

How can we save our goaltenders, now and in the future? 

Sources

Cohen, R. (2022, October 17). Thatcher Demko: From his mother’s eyes. EP Rinkside. https://eprinkside.com/2021/03/02/thatcher-demko-from-his-mothers-eyes

Tyler, G. (2023, December 13). Reverse VH + RVH guide for goalies: How and when to use RVH. Goalie Coaches. https://goaliecoaches.com/rvh-goalies-execute-use/

Dillon, B. (2019, February 4). The evolution of different goaltending styles. Ontario Minor Hockey Association. https://www.omha.net/news_article/show/631894-the-evoution-of-different-goaltending-styles

SPORTSNET. (n.d.). NHL Highlights | Jets vs. Canucks - March 9, 2024. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGu4upjEoJ4