Quote:
Originally Posted by Textcritic
I personally have no complaints about Rittich's 2017–18 season, and am perfectly comfortable with him moving forward. He was a rookie last year, and it is little surprise that he struggled with a rather sudden increase of immediate expectations. He has been through it now, and I see no reason why he won't be in a better headspace this time around if he is suddenly needed to fill in as the starter. Prior to Smith's injury Rittich was fantastic: he looked consistently prepared, focused, and played a simple game with very few mistakes. He struggled to adjust, but that is to be expected for a goalie playing his first NHL season, and with only three months of on-the-job experience.
|
Hopefully you’re right and he has a bit more confidence. My point was that I don’t think Treliving will give the backup role as much rope of whoever is backup if they don’t look confident. Flames just haven’t had a good track record of having reliably confident backups, from Ramo Hiller, all the way back to Karlssson.