In 65 minutes of hockey against the visiting Toronto Maple Leafs on Wednesday (Jan. 3), the Anaheim Ducks were outshot 57-28 in a 2-1 overtime loss . Yes, you read that right. The Maple Leafs had 57 shots on goal. That’s a record this season. Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, William Nylander, John Tavares, Morgan Reilly – the Big Five, as it were – who Maple Leafs management has gone all-in on, accounted for 39 of those shots, and some combination of them factored into each goal.
Ducks goaltender Lukáš Dostál is the sole reason the Ducks weren’t laughed off their own ice. His record-setting 55-save performance was nothing short of spectacular. Let’s put it into perspective.
Before the Game
Let’s contextualize what Dostál was getting himself into before the game. The Ducks were coming off a New Year’s Eve blowout loss to the Edmonton Oilers, and Dostál hadn’t made an appearance since his Dec. 23 start against the Seattle Kraken. The team had scored just nine goals in its previous five games, including a couple of losses in which they were shut out. He, however, had been playing pretty well in his previous batch of games. So, first appearance in a long time, insufficient goal support, and coming off a bad loss, and who does he get as his opponent? The high-octane Maple Leafs who boast one of, if not the best, top-six forward groups in the league. Who is better? You all can debate that.
During the Game
The big question entering the game was how the Ducks’ team defense was going to manage the up-tempo and voluminous attack of the Maple Leafs. It would take serious commitment to team defense – all five guys on the ice bearing down and remaining responsible in the defensive zone to limit the quality of chances.
Let’s start with the first period, which ended with the Maple Leafs doubling up the Ducks in shots 18-9, but the score tied at zero. The Ducks only went shorthanded once. The most eye-popping stat, though? The Maple Leafs had five high-danger scoring chances to the Ducks’ one. And yet, Dostál stopped everything. He was technically sound, athletic, sharp, and tracked pucks well.
The second and third periods were problematic because they spent eight of the final 30 minutes of the game on the penalty kill. The Maple Leafs pounded Dostál and the Ducks relentlessly over the final two frames with 39 shots, during which the scoring chances were 15-6 (four high-danger ones apiece). Matthews had chance after chance. The way he and Marner found each other in good scoring areas, seemingly at will, was sensational. They just ran into a goalie who was on top of his game that night. However, their persistence paid off, and they found a way to get one more by Dostál than the Ducks got by Martin Jones.
Putting Dostál’s Performance Into Perspective
The performance set the Ducks record for saves in a game. It narrowly beat John Gibson’s previous record-breaking outing against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Feb. 10, 2023, when he made 53 saves on 59 shots. Dostál now sits atop the franchise record book that includes a long line of respected goalies, including Gibson, Jean-Sebastien Giguere, Jonas Hiller and Guy Hebert, to name a few. It also set the high mark this season in the NHL for saves in a game.
There are plenty of reasons that make this performance all the more impressive. First: the opponent. The feat is impressive no matter who it’s against, but when you consider he made 55 saves in 65 minutes of play against that team, almost a save a minute, it’s another level. Two: it was the level of activity. The puck was in the Ducks’ defensive zone all night. They had to kill 10 minutes in penalties. It wasn’t a back-and-forth hockey game; the Ducks really didn’t have the puck all that much. Three: the team in front of him. The Ducks continue to rebuild and shore up the holes in their lineup that have existed for years. They have the pieces to get there. But for now, it’s a work in progress, which makes it tough to be a goalie in Anaheim. No goalie would ever admit it, of course, but it’s true.
Does it Mean Anything for the Goalie Situation in Anaheim?
It’s tough to say if this means anything big picture for the Ducks. Does one performance all a sudden shift the tide in favor of Dostál and compel general manager Pat Verbeek to try and trade John Gibson? Unlikely. And he shouldn’t because Gibson is still an excellent goalie in his prime who gives the Ducks the best chance to win each night. It would take Gibson wanting out or such a wide discrepancy in the quality of play between the two for the Ducks to consider making a permanent change in who gets the majority of starts.
That said, let’s not pretend Dostál’s performance wasn’t one for the books. It may be a brief moment in what projects to be a long career as a starting goaltender, but it was a special moment indeed. One that seems unlikely to be broken in the Ducks’ record book any time soon.
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