Rule # 3 Play Your Angles Right

Copyright © Jukka Ropponen 2001

Article 4/5

Why are the angles so important?

Think about the game situations you face every week as a goaltender. How often does the puck hit you and how often do you make a save based reaction after seeing where the puck is being shot? You can also do a little test by taping a NHL game from TV. Find a great catch glove save and then analyze that save in slow motion or frame by frame. In most of the cases you will find that the goalie positioned himself properly before the shot was taken and the puck actually hit his catch glove. About 90% of the movement happened after the puck was already in his glove. Still, when you see these moves it looks like the goalie made a great save with a huge reach.

It is a mathematical fact that most of the shots are impossible to stop if a goalie just stands on the goal line and trusts his/her reactions. If you want to make the calculation yourself go to The Exploratorium's site and use their calculations to define how fast you would have to move to make the save by reaction only.

Bottom line is that it is in most cases: IT IS MORE IMPORTANT WHAT YOU DO BEFORE THE SHOT IS TAKEN, THAN AFTER! This is because a goaltender has to align himself so that he/she covers as much of the net as possible at all times when a shot is taken. This way gives himself/herself the best possible chance to make the save. Of course correct angle play does not solve everything, but it's a big part of comprehensive goaltending.

Understand the angles and use them to your advantage!

As a goalie you have to understand the angles and how different people see them. Look at the pictures on the right as they explain it very well.

Let's get started by thinking how the puck sees various situations as this is the basics for your angle plays. A goaltender has to align himself/herself with the puck on the center of the net. The most common problem with young goalies is that they align themselves in the center of the net by the forward carrying the puck. By doing this they leave too much room on the other side of the net depending whether the forward shoots left or right. This is caused by the fact that when a goalie aligns himself with the forward, he/she may get a feeling of being centered when the puck actually is 2-3 feet to the left or right. Therefore the goalie is not centered by the spot where the shot is being taken.

A lot of forwards don't think this way or understand it. This can be seen in the situations where, for example, left shooters have a tendency to go to the high catch glove side for right handed goalies. This would be the right target if the puck would leave from where the forwards eyes are as that is where they see empty space. If we would go and drop down to the puck level and see where the empty space is from that perspective, we would realize that correctly aligned, the goalie actually has his/her gloves covering the top corners and the only open room is a narrow area underneath the gloves and at the 5-hole.

Coaches should demonstrate this effect to their goalies by using ropes tied to the corners of the goal and then draw them to the puck. Have your goalie move back and forth to find the right distance to come out (gloves covering top shelves). Move around and do this from several different positions to help your goalie and repeat it often enough during the season so that your goalies don't lose that perspective. Truangle device is also practical to use for these drills.

Goalies, explain this to your coaches and ask them to help you with your angles. Goalies need to work on their angles from straight-ahead as well as from the side. Using the ropes will demonstrate to you how much you need to come out when the puck is carried more to the side. Basically the smaller the angle the less you need to go out and vice versa. Remember the basic rule of gloves covering the top corners when a goalie is out at the right distance. This is assuming that the goalie has the skating ability to match the level of the play in his/her league. Remember also that there are situations where you can't go out as much as you would normally need and you need to adjust your play in those situations. A good example is a play where you have another forward free on the opposite side and if you go out to where you normally should a successful pass would give the opponents a free shot at an open net.

Go out early enough so that you have room to telescope back towards your net when needed. If the attack is coming towards your net with good speed and you get caught standing still you will not have very good chances to move on lateral passes or possible dekes.

Last I wanted to mention something on angles and break-aways as I'm often asked this question. When should a goalie start backing up, how fast and at what distance? Basically the goalie should adjust his/her speed to the forwards speed as then one can follow a forwards moves and dekes easier. The correct distance is explained so that if a goalie does a sudden stop and extends his/her stick as far as he/she can, he/she would be able to touch the puck that the forward is carrying.

In general, I like to see my goalies going out to the level of the hash marks and start to back-up when the forward comes to the shooting distance and becomes dangerous. Although this needs to be adjusted based on each individual and their skills and capabilities.

     Here you see the basic view of how a left shooter sees the goal with the goalie aligned properly.

     Now we have moved the camera on top of the puck and you see the puck's view on the same situation. Compare this image and the one above to understand the differences.

     In this situation, the ideal position for the goalie would be a little more out to get those gloves to cover the top corners.

     In this view, you see the goalie back on the goal line with the camera placed on the ice level in front of the left shooter.

     This last photo demonstrates to you how much of the net the goalie covers by coming out on the angle shots.