LOS ANGELES – Henrik Lundqvist sat at his locker in the visitor’s dressing room, slowly stripping off his equipment. He raised a towel to his face, wiping off four hours worth of sweat, and threw it to the ground in front of him. He unwound the incredible amount of tape he’d wrapped around his shins earlier that afternoon, and left it in the puddle of liquid — probably a combination of water and sweat — that was pooled around his feet.
This is Henrik Lundqvist defeated; Henrik Lundqvist truly shelled. It doesn’t happen often. The New York Rangers goaltender had given up five goals in a game just three times over the last three years — a span of 221 games including the playoffs. After Saturday night’s loss to the Los Angeles Kings in Game 2 of the Stanley Cup Final, that number inched to four.
“You have to move on,” the 32-year-old goaltender said, staring blankly ahead from under a Rangers’ baseball cap. “A bounce here and there and it could have been a different score, you know? We just came up short.”
Of course, we cannot possibly go on without talking about the third goal. Early in the third period, with the Kings down 4-2, Matt Greene took a wrist shot from the point that sneaked into the back of the net while L.A. winger Dwight King, who was planted in Lundqvist’s crease all night, toppled on top of the Rangers’ goaltender.
Lundqvist felt he was interfered with and that King had pinned his right leg down, preventing him from moving to the puck, but referee Dan O’Halloran was pointing at the net and skating away while the goal buzzer was going off around Staples Center and the Kings had gotten back into the game.
“I’m extremely disappointed on that call or non-call,” Lundqvist said after the game. “They’ve got to be consistent with that rule. In the second period we get called for a penalty and the puck isn’t even there. They score a goal and I can’t even move.”
Rangers forward Benoit Pouliot had in fact been called for goaltender interference earlier in the game, when he collided with Kings netminder Jonathan Quick as he tried to cut in front of the net. That’s why Lundqvist screamed at O’Halloran and waved his arms immediately after the goal, and minutes later, during a timeout, had a long, tense conversation with the official as well.
But Lundqvist ended up skating away while O’Halloarn was still talking, shaking his head as he returned to his crease.
“He said the puck had already passed me. I don’t buy it,” Lundqvist said. “That’s a wrist shot that I’m just going to reach out for and I can’t move. It’s a different game after that. It’s such an important play in the game.”
It’s rare you see Lundqvist so at odds with what’s happening around him. Despite allowing four goals, he’d actually played a tremendous game.
L.A. couldn’t beat him until the second period, when the Rangers turned the puck over in their own end and the Kings quickly converged, just like they did in overtime of Game 1. Lundqvist made one sprawling, sliding stop and then nearly made another, stretching from well out of position with his stick. But he could only watch as the puck slid just under his blade and slowly into the net.
Then, later in the period, the Kings got a power play point shot that was deflected twice through a screen and into the back of the net. You could argue there was little Lundqvist could do on either goal. On one he was left all alone by his defence, the other he couldn’t even see.
And the third, with Lundqvist pinned to the ice under King, was the goal that changed the game.
The fourth goal was maybe the only one you can argue Lundqvist should have had, as Marian Gaborik banged in a loose puck off a Rangers turnover deep in their own end.
Finally, the fifth goal, in double overtime, was a deflected point shot no one would have stopped.
“We all battled. I know I battled,” Lundqvist said. “When you play five periods, obviously the difference is not very big.”
It wasn’t. The Kings weren’t able to score easily, despite doing it five times. It took broken plays, turnovers and deflections to get any rubber past Lundqvist. Sometimes it seems that’s the only way to beat him — create havoc. Produce chaos, mayhem, disorder all around him and then maybe you can sneak a puck past. That’s what it takes. He’s that good.
All the saves he makes, all the point shots directed towards the corners by blocker or pads, all the attempts from the slot that catch just enough equipment to stay out, are no mistake. And that was Lundqvist in overtime. He didn’t have to dive across his crease, he didn’t have to reach out in vain from a helpless position, he didn’t have to be desperate. You can make a strong case — as you can on most nights — that he was the Rangers best player.
But he still lost. And the loss still weighs heavy upon him. After he’d stripped off all his equipment, after he’d talked to the press, after he’d told the world how disappointed he was in the officiating and the result of the game, Lundqvist stood at his locker by himself for a long moment.
He stroked his Swedish beard and looked down at his locker, like he was lost in thought, contemplating something. Half a minute passed before Lundqvist reached down, picked up his skates in one hand, an equipment bag in another, and began walking towards the trainer’s room with nothing more on his feet than socks. He left sweat-pooled footsteps in his wake, along with an incredible amount of frustration.
Henrik Lundqvist was defeated.