The next time Frederik Andersen has a shutout going in the third period, you are allowed to mention the “S-word”. Shutout. That’s right. You can go ahead and say it, tweet it, scream it in the street. Freddie doesn’t mind. He says it is okay with him.
“I don’t really care,” Andersen told Sporting News Canada in a recent interview. “There’s how many people watching, there’s how many people in the stands? Pretty sure one will say ‘shutout’ every game.”
It’s one of the more odd concepts in sports where some fans will lose their minds if someone mentions the word “shutout” while there is one in progress, as if the mere mention of the word on Twitter or in the stands or in your living room will have any effect on what happens on the ice.
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Some players too shudder at the thought, but Andersen is not going to be one to let something so trivial impact his performance. In reality, playing to shutout your opponent is the point of the game.
“In this room, we don’t really care, we don’t talk about it,” said Andersen. “That’s not really the purpose. I mean we play to shut out teams all the time, that’s the point of the game. It’s nothing really that has to be said, it’s not like we’re going into the third period being like, ‘Oh, let’s play for the shutout’.”
Think about it. Shouldn’t there be even more pressure to not allow a goal early in the game when it’s still scoreless and a goal against could have a big swing on the direction the game takes? Or what about when a team is trailing by a goal late in the game where allowing another would significantly reduce the chances of coming back to win? Why should the chance at putting up a goose egg have any effect? Why should it play with your mind more when you are up 3-0 with a few minutes left in the third period? A goalie can’t “try harder” to make a save with two minutes left when they’re up 3-0 than they did in the first 58 minutes to get to that point.
“Exactly, it’s the same if you’re down 4-3 in a little bit higher scoring of a game, you still want to have that same mindset of trying to make the next save so we have a chance to come back,” said Andersen. “That’s what, for goalies, is the biggest thing, to have that mental strength to be able to focus and keep the same mindset throughout the game. You want to just keep playing and think about the next shift. It’s such a cliché but it’s really how you have to approach every shift you play and every shot you face. Obviously when you have a shutout it’s great, you try to keep it going but at the end of the day, you’re doing what you can in every situation to try to save it.”
Essentially, Andersen just worries about making the next save. If the clock happens to run out before he allows a goal, so be it. Make the next save more often than not and the wins – and shutouts – will be there.
There was a time when Andersen, like most people, believed a lot more strongly in the potential of jinxing a result but he recalled a time while still playing in Denmark where he put that belief to rest. He remembered his coach came into the locker room between the second and third period in a game where they had a shutout in tact and said, “Let’s play for the shutout.” Everyone’s jaws dropped, he said, but an hour or so later, the result showed there was nothing to be shocked about.
“Like literally as his speech to the boys between the second and third period,” recalled Andersen. “Everyone couldn’t believe it but still we ended up winning, ended up getting the shutout. So yeah, sometimes you just got to go with what’s realistic to believe in.”
Two weeks ago, the 28-year-old Andersen earned consecutive shutouts in a 1-0 victory against the New Jersey Devils and a 6-0 win over the Montreal Canadiens. His shutout streak was snapped at 140:01 last Monday against the Arizona Coyotes when Brendan Perlini scored 9:53 into the first period in what turned out to be a 4-1 loss for the Maple Leafs.
Andersen knew full well he was on a hot stretch, having made 85 consecutive saves (he didn’t know the exact number). Ideally, he said he doesn’t want to be thinking at all.
“You obviously see it creeping closer and you’re cognizant that you haven’t let in a goal but you still want to play and think about the next shot, the next save, the next situation you are going to face,” said Andersen. “When you start thinking about other things, it will start to occupy your mind and the best thing is not to be thinking at all when you’re playing and just feel in the flow of the game. It’s different for every goalie, but the way I feel, it’s just best when you’re just in the zone and in the flow of the game instead of thinking about everything.”
It’s clear that Andersen believes highly in the importance of achieving a mental clarity during a game.
“When you play a hockey game, nothing else in the world really matters,” he said. “Once you step into the rink, you need to have the mindset that it doesn’t matter what’s happening anywhere else apart from what you need to do.”
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So, too, does Andersen’s head coach Mike Babcock, though he cautioned about the difference between controlling your routine and letting it control you.
“I think each guy has to (create a routine) as long as it’s things he can control,” said Babcock. “If it’s things he can’t control, it’s craziness, but if it’s things you can control, I think getting in a routine is real important. Big part of superstition in sport is trying to control the uncontrollable and that’s all great as long as you are in control of it. If you drive to the rink and someone’s in your parking spot and that’s going to wreck your game, I don’t think that’s probably a good idea.”
Goalies can be odd creatures by nature. Many will give off an aura that says, “Don’t talk to me, don’t even look at me,” on game days. Some do not address the media after morning skates. But Andersen is not among them. He does not seek out conversation on game days, but is certainly not unapproachable. He sits calmly at his locker after taking his chest protector off, often with his pads and skates still on. He does not joke around or quip with teammates. If you have questions for him, now is the time. He often spends 10 to 15 minutes with the media, offering insightful responses and is usually one of the last players to disappear behind closed doors.
He was not always this way though. Maybe not quite at the level of letting himself be disrupted by an unidentified car in his parking spot, but Andersen admitted he has learned to relax his demeanor on game days from the hyper-focused approach he used when he played in Denmark and then subsequently when he broke into the NHL with the Anaheim Ducks. Playing far more games in the NHL than the 30 or so per season he played in Denmark, Andersen said he quickly found it mentally exhausting to be zoned in from the moment he woke up on game days.
“That’s one of the things I’ve grown out of a little bit,” explained Andersen. “Instead of having to use the whole day to try to get in that zone or mindset, I’ve been better at just doing it as I go to the game at the rink at night so maybe it’s three hours of your day leading up and you get into it instead of using 12 hours where you drain yourself. You have way more game days where you’ve got to be using your focus and that can be draining.”
For 7:00 o’clock games, Andersen likes to leave for the rink at 4:15pm. Once he arrives at the arena, he takes a few sticks out to the bench and works to perfect each one’s tape job in the serenity of an otherwise virtually empty arena. He’ll finish up with his sticks, join his teammates for a little pregame soccer and grab something to eat all while slowly building up his focus, while still willing talk to a teammate, coach or trainer. As the countdown starts on the jumbotron above center ice about 75 minutes prior to puck drop, Andersen puts on some music, goes through his pregame stretch and suits up in his equipment. From that point on, it’s time for the ultra focused approach.
A timeframe a little more manageable than nearly 12 hours, whether it leads to a shutout or not.