Chicago Blackhawks: A goaltending comparison with Edmonton Oilers

The Chicago Blackhawks and Edmonton Oilers need their goalies to play well in order to advance. Who has the early advantage?

Everyone knows that the Chicago Blackhawks have some awesome goaltending. Corey Crawford has been one of the best goalies in the league for going on a decade now and there is no worry with him in the crease. There was some injury concern a few years back but it has been good for a while now. He has been stellar in playoff series’ before and when the NHL returns to play, this should be no different.

He platooned with Robin Lehner all season long. Together, they formed one of the best goalie duos in the NHL. It was a lot of fun to watch but without knowing what the coronavirus was going to do to our world, Chicago traded Lehner to the Vegas Golden Knights. That was they telling everyone at the trade deadline that they were throwing in the towel as sellers and looking on to next season.

Well, Lehner is gone now and they got Malcolm Subban in return amongst other assets from Vegas. Subban is a nice backup goalie but he isn’t going to play over Crawford unless there is an injury. This tandem might not be as strong as the one the Hawks had before, but it is still one to be pretty confident in going into the playoffs. If they lost the Edmonton series, it would almost certainly not be the goalie’s fault.

How is Edmonton’s duo? They ran a platoon similar to Chicago with Mike Smith and Mikko Koskinen. Smith played in 39 games and Koskinen played in 38. Mike Smith should be a goalie that Chicago fans remember because he was the starting goalie for the Arizona Coyotes during the 2012 playoff series between Chicago and Arizona. Smith and the Coyotes actually took down the Chicago Blackhawks that season.

Edmonton’s goalies both had similar records but Koskinen had way better overall numbers. Koskinen had a 2.75 goals-against average and a .917 save percentage. Those are very similar numbers to Crawford’s 2.77 goals-against average and he also had a .917 save percentage in 40 games. Smith had a 2.95 goals-against average and a .902 saver percentage.

If the Oilers start the 38-year-old Smith, that would be a mistake because they would be giving Chicago a significant goaltending advantage. If Koskinen is their guy, it becomes almost a wash between the two sides. The only thing that favors Crawford in that matchup would be experiencing. Corey Crawford knows exactly what it takes to be the backbone of a championship team, so much so that he has done it twice.

The Edmonton Oilers might have more firepower than the Blackhawks do but with Crawford in the net in a short series, you just never know. This should, without question, be a very entertaining series all around.