Got my ass kicked today, how do i come back?

[RedRook]

Got beat earlier today by the best team in the league, which to be honest we were expecting. However todays was just rediculous, im not going to say the score but suffice to say that i am feeling more than a little sh*t.
I mean, the things that were getting past me couldve been stopped by a peewee on his first day. I wasnt covering up, wasnt mopping up rebounds or preventing them at all, and some of the things i did were just plain stupid.
Now ive lost worse than this in the past but todays was just horrible because we were doing pretty well untill the 3rd and it all went. Usually if i let one in i can convince myself that it wasnt my fault, that the D was bad, or there was someone in my way or whatever and it wont really affect me, and i learn from it. But a lot of today was purely my fault. It was getting so bad in the 3rd that our captain actually came up to me, took my trapper, got down on the ground and showed me how to cover a puck (taking the piss obviously and i think he was pretty angry, but so was i and him embarassing me further did not help. )
In all honestly the rest of the team played pretty badly as well, and my defence was at times appalling, and in the 3rd the other team was obviously going all out, but that doesnt excuse my playing.
I guess basically what i'm asking is how do you come back from the crappest game youve ever played?

[elite]

I've had a lot of crappy games in my life. But you just have to suck it up and go out there the next game and play your game. Don't change anything. That's the worst thing you can do: change something after one bad game. Play a few bad games before changing something. Once you get your confidence back the next game, you'll feel much better about your style and shrug that bad game off as just a bad day.

[pens4life29]

Sounds pretty rough. What I do to bounce back is after a bad performance, is to try and go through the game again in my head and think about what went wrong on each goal, why it happend, and how I could correct it next time I find myself in that situation. Then I like to take off a few days if possible and try not to do anything hockey related. Then when I go back to the rink I have a clear head, and can forget about the last outing and really get pumped about playing again. I also like to get a mental list of things I did wrong, and really try to make work on them in practice.

When just being at the rink becomes no fun, it's time to take a few days off. Hope that helps and good luck...

[buffay34]

I keep seeing these threads about goalies having a bad game, they blow it all out of proportions, and feel they need to create a thread about it. Truth is, you are NOT a professional, and even at that, look at the NHL goalies. **** happens, pucks go in, puck stay out! Live on, suck it up, and play better next game!

[vinny]

Originally Posted by elite

I've had a lot of crappy games in my life. But you just have to suck it up and go out there the next game and play your game. Don't change anything. That's the worst thing you can do: change something after one bad game. Play a few bad games before changing something. Once you get your confidence back the next game, you'll feel much better about your style and shrug that bad game off as just a bad day.

Same here. Playing goal is such a great lesson for life. **** isn`t always gonna go your way you can have a great game and the result can be terrible.
It depends on you on the team you;re playing and the quality of chances both ways.

Good call by elite... How you move on from your bad goals and bad games is one of the more important if not the most impaortant thing about being a goaltender at any level.

You`re no good to your team if you`re tripping about the last bad goal or last bad game All you can do is steady yourself and stop or try to stop the next one.
Look at resetting as a skill like any other goaltending skill you are trying to perfect.

No blame... not to yourself not to your teammates... Stop the next one

[NedofRock]

Happens to us all at some point and to be honest, its sometimes a good thing. You learn more from losing than winning. Analyse how the goals went in and what you can do about it, i think sometimes keepers try and be a little too individual as well, is there anything your defence could have done better?

It be right anyway, you'll bounce back Same thing happened to me 2 games ago, best team in the league and we lost 9-4, i had something like 45 shots on me but wasnt happy at all with some soft goals i let in, beat myself up over it, sorted my head out, worked on things and let 1 in the next game.

[avatarkava]

Looking back, the single greatest point in my development as a goaltender was losing a game in the semis at a national championship event that I knew my team would have won had I been more focused. From that point on, I vowed to do all the work I could to never let my team lose a game on account of my mental preparedness or resiliency.

Physically, you're not going to stop everything. Sometimes the shot placement is perfect. Sometimes the other team gets a few lucky bounces. What I've found helps me get over 'bad goals' is to give myself 5-10 seconds immediately after the goal to analyze in a very calm, composed way what I did wrong that caused the goal.

After that quick analysis I put the goal into the back of my mind, promising myself I will revisit it after the game. As long as I truly believe this and know deep down that I'll handle it later, I've found that it doesn't creep back into my thoughts. This trust in yourself doesn't happen right away - it takes time, but if you stick with it I've found it does work.

After the game I take some time to think about each goal I allowed and what I can do to minimize the chances of allowing a goal like that in the future. Sometimes I can point to a loss in focus, other times it's a technical flaw that needs practice to be ironed out.

Either way, it's a measured, reasoned approach and adhering to something like this will help take a lot of the emotional highs and lows out of your game - my results on the rink have been a heck of a lot more consistent.

[Damion]

I read your post and all of the replys and yes there will be good games and bad games.

However part of the post didn't sit right with me and is a good clue as to why you will continue to have more bad games than you have to.


"Usually if i let one in i can convince myself that it wasnt my fault, that the D was bad, or there was someone in my way or whatever "

You need to make yourself personaly accountable for every single goal until you do this you will continue to hold yourself back from developing as much as possible.

Yes there will be goals where your D man didn't do their job but that is not a good enough excuse for getting scored on because if the puck got past you then you obviously did somthing wrong as well. So focus on what you did wrong and how to do it right because that is under your controll.

There will also be freaky fluke goals where there is not much you could have done just brush those ones off as nobody blames you for those ones anyways.

You also need to take on the attitude that if a goal goes in becuase you couldn't see it then you wernt looking hard enough.

[NedofRock]

Originally Posted by Damion

However part of the post didn't sit right with me and is a good clue as to why you will continue to have more bad games than you have to.


"Usually if i let one in i can convince myself that it wasnt my fault, that the D was bad, or there was someone in my way or whatever "

Actually, i didnt spot this when i read his post (im tired), glad you pointed it out.

The ability to 'forget' what just happened in a game situation and move on is what sometimes seperates good goalies from great ones but i dont think denial can be factored in with that. If goals go in, you have to look at yourself first and foremost THEN other factors such as your defence. In a way, you are there to bail out the mistakes the defence might make (breakaways etc..) so id be taking a long hard look at how and why the goals went in.

You know, were they on your glove side? If so, why...was the glove too high/low? Did they go in because your movement wasnt so good etc.. etc... Once to start to see where they are getting past you, you can do something about it.

Im not suggesting that this is a regular thing for you by any means, you seem quite shocked about the fact it happened. So maybe its not your technique, you didnt mention the defence played any better or worse than they normally do so, is it something else? Did you get enough sleep, did you prepare the same way you normally do?

Its probably just a freak game anyway, like people have said, its a good thing sometimes and a great opportunity to take a look at yourself and improve.

[RedRook]

Thanks folks, yeah i didnt really mean denial, so much as i can can put it out of my head and not let it affect me. But cheers anyway i see what youre getting at. Hopefully it was just a freak game...

[VirtueTech]

I didn't read the entire thread, so some of what I have to say...might have been said already:

The name of the game is to score goals. You win by scoring more goals then the other team. You're not going to stop everything. And worrying about every goal is going to make you suck even worse.

Just look at Broduer...the guy can suck big time one night, and come back the other. No one says he is a bad goalie.

[marchockey]

I would have to say the first time I played in an actual league game, my girlfriend at the time was our goalie (and the only woman on the team) tweeked her ankle and we were too proud to call it a day, so I decided to play goal with her gear. No disrespect to her, but she's 5'4 and a little chubby at the time, whereas me I am 5'11 and about 160 nothing fit and the opposition showed no sympathy whatsoever

her helmet : Adult Small .. i wear a Large so I got a headache within 5 minutes. That the game was played on sport court in the middle of the summer certainly didn't help ..
chest protector : ditto
glove/blocker : She had an Intermediate with Jr palm : I wear adult large
jill : Not gonna go there. I played with my regular cup obviously
breezers : she's about the equivelant of a men's size 28, whereas I'm a 34. I think you can imagine the discomfort
leg pads : she wore 30's at the time. I barely fit into my 34's anymore.
skates : even at the intermediate level, having goalie skates makes a big difference. I hadn't quite broken in my new pair, so I had mistakingly brought an old pair that was falling apart. over the course of the day, they basically did.
stick : when skating out I have a righty stick. she used what nearly all us goalies do which is one that's held in the right hand.

the result? as I recall I did descent all things considering .. stopped about 2/3rd's of the shots but got so exasperated, at the opponent's lack of respect and our teammate's lack of defence. I somehow kept my cool about it somewhat telling myself at least I am not in physical pain. but it took a lot to get me back in the crease after that. now it's my favourite position in any sport, though I still have a lot to work on I have gotten considerably better the last few years. (this had happened around 2000 or so)

so my advise is .. forget this game as quickly as you can, or if it comes back to your thoughts, think of the nice saves you made and how much you've improved since you started playing. it's like someone learns a new language. they may learn a little, they may learn a lot, but they all come out of it with knowledge they didn't have when they started.

[RedRook]

Originally Posted by marchockey

I would have to say the first time I played in an actual league game, my girlfriend at the time was our goalie (and the only woman on the team) tweeked her ankle and we were too proud to call it a day, so I decided to play goal with her gear. No disrespect to her, but she's 5'4 and a little chubby at the time, whereas me I am 5'11 and about 160 nothing fit and the opposition showed no sympathy whatsoever

her helmet : Adult Small .. i wear a Large so I got a headache within 5 minutes. That the game was played on sport court in the middle of the summer certainly didn't help ..
chest protector : ditto
glove/blocker : She had an Intermediate with Jr palm : I wear adult large
jill : Not gonna go there. I played with my regular cup obviously
breezers : she's about the equivelant of a men's size 28, whereas I'm a 34. I think you can imagine the discomfort
leg pads : she wore 30's at the time. I barely fit into my 34's anymore.
skates : even at the intermediate level, having goalie skates makes a big difference. I hadn't quite broken in my new pair, so I had mistakingly brought an old pair that was falling apart. over the course of the day, they basically did.
stick : when skating out I have a righty stick. she used what nearly all us goalies do which is one that's held in the right hand.

the result? as I recall I did descent all things considering .. stopped about 2/3rd's of the shots but got so exasperated, at the opponent's lack of respect and our teammate's lack of defence. I somehow kept my cool about it somewhat telling myself at least I am not in physical pain. but it took a lot to get me back in the crease after that. now it's my favourite position in any sport, though I still have a lot to work on I have gotten considerably better the last few years. (this had happened around 2000 or so)

so my advise is .. forget this game as quickly as you can, or if it comes back to your thoughts, think of the nice saves you made and how much you've improved since you started playing. it's like someone learns a new language. they may learn a little, they may learn a lot, but they all come out of it with knowledge they didn't have when they started.

Wow that sounds awful! I did make a couple of decent saves that i was proud of so i'll try to focus on them i guess, thanks.

[PSULion22]

I have a good one for you too.

A teammate asked me to fill in at the last minute for one of his other teams' goalie. I should say that I am a defenseman first, and a pretty good one. In goal, I'm ok, I have my moments, but on the whole I'm average at best. To that point I had only played in a c-level league. This fill in was for an A-level league that has some very, very good players. This was my first game on this rink, which is much smaller and a different surface. During warm-ups, my team decided that they weren't going to take regular shots, just dekes and 2-0's. So I never got my angles set right or a feel for the court.

It was the worst game ever. I allowed 18 goals, yes 18. 5 of which went off a post and in, 1 of them off two posts and in. If I had gotten a good warm-up, I probably would have stopped them because my angles would have been a little better. The rest of the goals were breakaways and odd-mans, none of my team played ANY defense at all. The other team just picked me apart. It sucked hardcore.

Well, as I'm coming off the rink, the team playing next asks me to stay. I ask if they just saw the game and are sure they want me to play. They say it wasn't my fault and there isn't anyone else. So I play - "Hey, it's your funeral". We win 4-3 with me playing one of the best games of my career (and the best to that point). I made so many great saves and stopped everything that should have been, including easily 10 spectacular saves in the final 3 minutes.

So the moral of the story is, don't get discouraged by one bad game because the next one could be great.

[foodsample]

I've had an experiance like that, I was playing in a tournament where each team played twice against the other 3 teams. My team was pretty much ****ed in the beginning since we only had 5 travel guys, with 5 inhouse to fill in. The first game against this team was 0-3 (not bad for 80 shots a game, n crap D). Then the second time we played them was one of the last games in the tournament we played, where we lost like 3-9. I felt bad that I couldn't play the same as before, (because how I saw it we could've tied lol).
But that was off 5 hours sleep, and some chips n gatorade in the morning. I've realized when I have a bad day it isn't because of what I did on the ice, but how I prepared for the game which for me are mainly tons of sleep (8-10 hrs), eating 3-4 hours before the game, drinking TONS of water the night before and up until the game. When I know I've done those I feel ontop of the world, and my reflexes are much better.
Hope that helps some