Jonathan Quick will make his eighth consecutive start on Thursday when the Kings play St. Louis. Previous to that, Quick had not played in more than three consecutive games this season. Of course, Terry Murray already acknowledged that he has erased his preseason goalie plan, the one that limited Quick to 57 games and had backup Jonathan Bernier playing once a week. Bernier is almost certain to see some action during this tough road trip, but asked whether he would start Quick on Thursday, Murray said with a laugh, “It’s pretty tough to not go back to him after that performance last night.”
Of course, that’s a reference to Quick’s 51-save shutout, which, at the risk of sounding hyperbolic, was truly a remarkable performance. Today, I asked Murray if he had any further thoughts on Quick’s effort after reviewing the game video…
MURRAY: “He was totally focused on the game. He just was so composed and read the play. They play east-west hockey, and you’ve got to be right on top of things to make it happen on some of those saves. He was outstanding. The play, the save when Jack Johnson had the big hit on Helm, and then Helm came in and found his own rebound on that play, that was a spectacular save. It’s a position that you have to have a `A’ game from, going into that build. Especially in the second period. They are unbelievable at recognizing the line-change situation, to take advantage of it with their experience in that building. How they can just continue to get pressure on top of you in that situation…
“You go back over the years, and their second periods are phenomenal for them. That’s where they break games open. Just 5-on-5, and then on top of that we had the two, back-to-back penalty kills. They put a lot of pressure. They recover the pucks and the play goes on for almost the full two minutes, non-stop, and so you’ve got to be really sharp on your changes. They can feed off of it and generate a lot, coming back at you. So Quick was obviously the man for the job last night.”
Bernier has not been in a game since the Nov. 24 loss to Montreal, so whenever he gets in, it will be after at least a three-week layoff. I asked Murray if Quick’s play last night had altered his plan for Bernier for the road trip.
MURRAY: “I’ve been looking at getting Bernier in here, in the last few actually. I played around with it against Minnesota at home, trying to get things set up for this road trip, which is a pretty demanding trip. They’re all going to be intense hockey games. But it’s Quick (against St. Louis).”
Quick is goalie King fans have been dreaming of for a long long time, awesome game against the Wings!
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Stagger Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:07 pm
@iansez,
Agreed! SUCH a long, long time.
Let’s hope he can stay fresh for the whole season.
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luc20rules Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 5:50 pm
@Stagger, He will need to be rested at least 8 to 10 regular season games from now to stay fresh for the playoffs. I am making this estimate by how he tired and his game tailed off in late March last year.
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Quick made spectacular saves last nite. Sorry, but that kid ain’t coming out now!
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Quick was fantastic last night! A lot of respect for him coming back from such a horrible game a couple days before. Does Bernier look a little bit different then last year, I feel a bit less confident in him this year.
Rich, how did Mitchell do in his first game back; and in your opinion, what line is Strum going to play on and with whom if he passes his physical?
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bmova Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:01 pm
@PleaseWintheCupthisYEAR!, He lead the team in minutes with like 27+!!!
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PleaseWintheCupthisYEAR! Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:32 pm
@bmova, I know… because they were down to 4 defensemen. But your first game back is most of time a bit challenging, possibly favoring the area you injured, getting used to game situations, etc.
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Well we want him rested for the end strech and the playoffs, you cant take a hot goalie out!!
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KingsFanFTW Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 1:49 pm
@pr0cess, true we all want him rested but if the goaile on fire why would u sit him down and put out his fire and then he become good but not on fire..
Quick always a great Goalie but we dotn see him on Fire at all he does good all the time but when he feels unstoppable that when he awesome Goalie
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Great choice , gotta keep quick in he is hot right now! Bernier will have his chances, has just lookd a bit shaky! Awesome having great goaltenders.
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KingsFanFTW Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 1:51 pm
@Guss, yea Bernier well have his chances but the good question will he do better then the beginning of this season i hope so i hope we dotn do another last season burn out Quick and when we need Quick at the Playoffs he already tired out but he did do great in last season just too tired to keep it up
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Stagger Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:11 pm
@KingsFanFTW,
Very true.
Even with your somewhat broken English, you make more sense than a lot of folks around here.
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I predicted Bernier would be the number 1 goalie by Christmas. I will take my crow medium rare please.
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KingsFanFTW Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 1:54 pm
@kozak, are u serious dotn get me wrong i like both of our goalie but Y u want Bernier number one when u got Quick that been prefect on the net right now he proven he number 1 Bernier hasnt proven it even tho he had played small games but that when he should proven to Quick that he wants to be number one but hey if he makes it then i wont worry caus ehe a good goalie i say next year he will be number one
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VanKingsFan Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:09 pm
@KingsFanFTW, Judging by your english you dont know what eating Crow means…
Thanks for coming clean Kozak… im sure its not hard to admit a mistake when the reality is amazing in itself
Bottom line, we have an elite goalie at #1, which is all we want, Bernier or no
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AZ King Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:09 pm
@kozak,
Good man!!
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oldthunder Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:31 pm
@kozak, I’m with you on that. I was more for Bernier at the start of the season but Quick is playing lights out hockey. You always ride the hot hand, hopefully TM doesn’t burn him out like last season.
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What's the frequency, Kenneth? Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:48 pm
@kozak, last season, it looked like the handwriting was on the wall. There’s no shame in it. I only ridiculed the fans who wanted to make an issue of it, rather than waiting to see what happened…and I’m glad the events were allowed to unfold impartially, as they did.
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mcsorleyfan Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 3:46 pm
@kozak, I don’t think any of us were looking to remind you of that; as I recall there was a bit of an agreement that we all support both of our keepers, with the understanding that they will give it all they have, and are still developing… Don’t kick yourself; heck, to have predicted Bernier’s response to part time work you’d have had to be Nostradamus.
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I remember that play. JJ made a big hit, but didn’t recover quick enough. Helm got right back up and had an uncontested path to fire the puck. Quick made an unbelievable stop on him, and JJ got bailed out. I remember thinking when play stopped”I would have liked to have seen what JJ’s reaction to Quick was”.
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Let’s just not burn the poor guy out.
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vplaza Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:00 pm
@let’s be frank, Let’s hope history doesn’t repeat itself. Maybe the second half of last year was an aberration, but if he doesn’t limit Quick’s starts, TM runs the risk of riding his horse too much like last year.
Then again, there’s no baby in waiting or an Olympic break this year, so who knows. No doubt JQ is hot, but TM needs to find a way to get him some days off.
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Dominick Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:10 pm
@let’s be frank,
Quick started to show signs around the 50 to 60 game mark. He’s in better shape this season, and has a better idea of what it’s like to play that many games. Not to mention all the points that vplaza also brought up. If TM is forced to play Quick 70 games, I think Quick will handle it better this time around. As I say this, I hope it dosn’t come to that. I still have faith in Bernier, so we’ll see what happens.
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Mike Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:18 pm
@let’s be frank, Certainly we do not want to burn Quick out. However the team is still playing for a spot in the playoffs and we need Quick in net.
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KC23 Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 4:07 pm
@let’s be frank, What good is a rested Quick if we don’t make the playoffs?
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Bernier will certainly get his looks in February, which looks to be a brutal month schedule wise, 13 games, 10 of them on the road, three back to back situations, with two of them on the road.
I bet Bernier gets the nod vs NSH or CHI this weekend though.
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KC23 Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 4:09 pm
@Will Hutchison, Yep, February is the most critical month by far. We win half those games in February, we’ll be in good shape the rest of the year.
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Who would have thought, when Quick was first called up two years ago, that he would blossom into the player we see today. I’m so proud of what this guy has become, and am so excited to think that he hasn’t even reached his full potential yet.
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Dominick Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:23 pm
@AZ King,
I’m proud of all the posters who faught tooth and nail with all the other posters that wanted to get rid of him.
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What's the frequency, Kenneth? Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:49 pm
@AZ King, I remember how he looked then, even losing games. I have to brag about seeing a pretty good goaltender with rough edges (some of which he still has–I hope he gets some time to work on his puck handling skills, if not soon, during the offseason.)
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QuicksDaMan Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 8:33 pm
@AZ King, I didn’t think I KNEW the kid was good! Last year was too much for a young player like Quick to handle. Got married, attended Olympics tryouts, became father and went to Olympics. Then was integral to team making playoffs. Yep he was tired and yep we lost in first round. But, this year JB will be productive backup and Kings will go deep into playoffs.
Quick is the man!
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…No sex or babies untill summertime!!
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Dominick Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:26 pm
@Doc. Mark 1968,
That would leave his wife pregnant till playoff time. Sex should be planned so that if he has a baby, the baby comes during the summer.
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Doc. Mark 1968 Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:43 pm
@Dominick,
Yes, technically this is what I meant!! Although I think athletes have diverging opinions on whether the actual act of sex leaves them invigorated, or feeling sluggish. So perhaps sex in and of itself is bad for him!
Speaking of children, many teams now have a fathers or a mothers trip where they travel with the team on the road. Does anyone know if the Kings are going to do this in the future?
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Dominick Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 2:46 pm
@Doc. Mark 1968,
Maybe lack of sex will keep him pissed off. Whatever he’s doing right now seems to be working.
Just wear a condom. :p
Please do not burn out Quick again!
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absolutely phenomenal how he came back from a bad game vs the wild never saw it like that before !!!!
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Only game i see Bernie playing on this trip is against Nashville and give Quick the blackhawks game but TM has done this twice already this year with the Columbus/Sharks and Sens/Habs and gave quick the start with the team that wasn’t suppose to be that good so idk. I would hope Bernie would be starting Nashville and not Chicago
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KC23 Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 4:10 pm
@kasey9, That would be my call as well.
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Quick’s only drawback has been inexperience. Every loss he’s made hasn’t been due to lack of talent. Only due to making easy to correct rookie mistakes. It’s silly how much people have argued and doubted him based on such silly errors which happen less and less as his career moves along.
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Jonathan Quick is already an outstanding goalie. He is only more consistent rebound control and more consistent handling of the puck away from having the makings of a future hall of fame goalie.
I know we are all a little gun shy about Quick getting burned out the same way he did last season. But I just don’t think that is going to be an issue this season. Rightfully or wrongfully TM had lost all confidence in Erik Ersberg last season. He does not have that issue with Bernier (at least not yet). Therefore, he will put him in enough games to make sure Quick is ready for the playoffs. Bernier just won’t be playing in as many games as TM envisioned at the beginning of the season. I predict Quick will start 65 games this season.
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Is it me, or did that last quote from Murray sound a lot like his references to Ersberg during last season…
Doesn’t bode well for Bernier.
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WHERE ARE THE BOO BIRDS NOW?
Hope the fair weather fans that were so unkind when made JQ made some errors last Saturday are sorry now. Remember this performance against Detroit next time JQ isn’t perfect okay?
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