NHL goaltenders grew up wanting to play the position closest to how the 35-year-old has played for the Montreal Canadiens since his NHL debut in the 2007-08 season.
“He was the gold standard of goaltending from his arrival in the League until his Stanley Cup (final) run (in 2021),” said Jack Allen, who played the last two seasons with Price in Montreal. “He was a role model for probably 85% of the goaltenders who started at that time, especially in Canada. He was the goalkeeper of our country. Everyone wanted to be Carey Price. Its impact will therefore be felt for many, many years. come.”
Carter Hart sits at the top of this list of goalies who wanted to play like Price.
The Philadelphia Flyers’ No. 1 goaltender was 9 years old and just getting started in the role when the 20-year-old Price played his first NHL season.
Hart has the magazines he collected featuring the Canadiens rookie safely stored at his parents’ home in Sherwood Park, Alta.
“I think every Canadian goaltender growing up followed Carey Price,” Hart said. “He was my idol and I watched everything he did so I had to be there to watch warm-ups and see everything, and there were some skating drills he did which of course I started to do during my warm-up before training back in pee wee. was just something about his game, the way he made it so easy and fluid, and I think that’s because of that all young goalkeepers goals idolized him.”
Price hasn’t played since April 29 and an offseason hasn’t alleviated concerns about a chronic and painful knee condition. He said on October 24 that he had no intention of retiring, but that his hopes of playing again after a so far unsuccessful rehabilitation after knee surgery in 2021 would require “that outside hope that a miracle to happen”.
The day after that press conference, there was a career retrospect authored by Price.
For all the awards and records set during his 15 seasons with the Canadiens, including the most wins (361) in the team’s storied history and the Hart Trophy as the NHL’s Most Valuable Player, the Vezina Award for the League’s Top Goaltender and the Ted Lindsay Award as Most Outstanding Player as Voted by Players in 2015, Price’s impact on the position itself may be even greater.
From the way he moved and played to the way he wore his equipment, Price is the most influential goaltender of the past decade. No one has moved the needle in the goaltending world quite like the goaltender from Little Lake Anahim, BC.
“He changed the way the game is played for goalies,” Hart said. “Less is more.”
That less-is-more efficiency with which Price moved through his crease became the gold standard for goaltenders, whether young like Hart or already in the NHL.
No matter how fast things happened around him, Price rarely broke his patterns, seemingly slowing the game down and forcing it to be played on his terms. Sure, there were flashy backups — windmill gloves, headfirst Superman dives, fully extended stick paddles, and Dominik Hasek-like barrel rolls — every once in a while, as needed. But Price’s calling card is his ability to beat plays for position, coming together and square to casually stifle seemingly glorious scoring chances in that Canadiens logo on his chest.
“When I first saw him play at the World Juniors [Championship in 2007] it was the first time I had seen a goalkeeper play so calmly and smoothly and I was like, ‘How is he? How does he already play better than everyone else in this position? said the Buffalo Sabers goaltender. Eric Comrie, who was 11 at the time. “It looked so calm, and he was so much better than everyone at that time. Even then, I remember thinking, ‘He’s the best goalie I’ve ever seen in my life’ and ‘He’s the guy I want to play as.’ And I think every kid growing up said, “I want to play like Carey Price,” because he looked so smooth and effortless, and he was always in position. He was the best goalkeeper in the world year after year after year.
It wasn’t just up-and-coming kids who wanted to play like Price. Several established NHL goaltenders, asked what other goalie skill they’d like to see under their Christmas tree for a 2016 edition of Unmasked, picked Price’s move in the crease.
“I’m going to Price’s skating right away,” said Devan Dubnyk, who led the NHL in goals-against average, save percentage and shutouts at the time. “If you’re as fluid and fast as he is and still there and ready, it all goes from there. Price pushes and stops and he’s ready like he’s floating there.”
Curtis McElhinney, who retired last season, called Price’s move effortless.
“It looks so calm, almost nonchalant,” McElhinney said. “But if he needs to go faster, it’s there without a second of hesitation.”
Price’s impact on the position didn’t end with his move – or at the Canadian border.
Pittsburgh Penguins goaltender Casey DeSmith is from New Hampshire, but he said Price influenced him more than any other goaltender. Some of that may have grown up in a family of Canadiens fans, but most of it had to do with the way Price played.
“He had it all: flawless technique, speed, good shot reading, good reactions,” DeSmith said. “When you look at how the game is played now from a goalkeeper position, a lot of it can be attributed to Price.
“The best goalkeepers in the world now, they move like him. Everything is clean, the hands are calm, no holes.”
Even Price’s equipment has sparked imitation in the goaltending community.
CCM launched a full line around Price’s preferences in 2013, and some of the subtle innovations and tweaks he’s added over the years have since become staples for other goaltenders.
Price introduced running the elastic knee strap to the outside of his calf rather than around the knee, removing the bootstrap that connected skate to skate and cutting his stick shanks to improve puck handling that , according to Hart, is seriously underestimated. . Several stick manufacturers are offering shortened models at retail, a nod to the widespread change initiated by Price.
Each is another example of how his impact will continue to be felt in the NHL even if he never comes back to the end.
The way Price played will always be the greatest legacy.
“His skating was phenomenal, so smooth and efficient and calm,” Hart said. “He never slipped too much, pushed too hard or made things harder than they were. Carey just made it so easy, and for us as goalkeepers, that’s how it is. that we want to play.”
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