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Newly signed and now two-time Boston Bruins goaltender
Anton Khudobin may have been on vacation in Sardinia when free agency began, but the 30-year-old knew where he wanted to be.
“It was a really quick signing,” Khudobin, who spent last season in the Anaheim Ducks organization, with the Ducks and their AHL affiliate San Diego Gulls, said of the July 1 signing with Boston. “I talked to my agent previously and I asked him which teams would be interested in me, so he said it might be this, that, and that. Whenever Boston came up, I said, ‘Boston? This is my preference. No doubt. Even if they’re going to give me a little less money than other teams, I’m going to go there.’”
And so returned Khudobin, on a two-year deal worth $2.4 million dollars ($1.2 million average annual value), to an organization he called his own for the better part of three seasons, including an improbable 2013 run to the Stanley Cup Final as the team’s backup to
Tuukka Rask.
In those seasons with the B’s, including one as a full-time member of the Big B’s, the 5-foot-11 netminder put up nine wins and a .920 save percentage in 14 games played, and noted the excitement that comes with a return to a familiar setting, even if some of the faces have changed.
“Whenever I came back here, I started driving the city,” Khudobin said. “I’m familiar with the buildings, stores, streets. Like ‘Oh, I remember this, I remember that.’ My comfort level is really good. I really feel comfortable here, plus I have friends here, which is important to me.”
Back in Boston, Khudobin, like many of his teammates, is ready to get going on a new season.
“You’re always excited. You always want to get games going. You want to get regular season going and hang out with the guys during practices, the games, the trips,” Khudobin said. “It’s always fun, especially here, where I know 60% of the guys and the management and the staff.”
A full participant throughout the group’s informal player-only skates at Warrior Ice Arena in Brighton, Khudobin has engaged in what he would consider a healthy competition with and against the man knocking at the door for his job in town, former first-round draft pick
Malcolm Subban.
“There’s always competition, no matter which position you play,” noted Khudobin. “There’s a little competition we have going on between players and goalies, which makes you better as a player.”
After three seasons in the American Hockey League, the latest of which ended with a bizarre and scary fractured larynx, it’s no secret that the 22-year-old is hungry for NHL playing time. But Khudobin, a veteran of 156 AHL contests since 2007-08 and 100 NHL games, knows how it all works.
“In every organization, it can be a little different, but it’s always going to be like this,” Khudobin said of the three-goalie battle for the crease. “I’ve been in the same situation when I got to training camp and always wanted to get to the first team. It’s normal that other goalies want to final the roster.
“It’s no doubt that Malcolm wants to be here, but I want to be here, too, so it’s going to be a healthy competition. It’s just going to be just a normal routine as I’ve always had before.”
But the competition is already in full swing on the ping-pong tables in the new players' lounge.
“Pretty good,” Khudobin, a native of Kamenogorsk, Kazakhstan, who actually noted that his uncle played in ping-pong tournaments and taught him how to play at a young age, said when asked of his luck on the tables. “I haven’t been playing in a while, but right now we have a table, so we’re playing everyday. We’ll get better. Spoons [Bruins forward Ryan Spooner] is actually pretty good. I just lost to him today, but we didn’t get really into it, right now we’re just trying to train ourselves, but as soon as everybody gets back, maybe we’re gonna have to have a tournament.”
With Khudobin, the Bruins know what they’re getting, and that’s more than they could ever say about the various netminders that have been brought in to replace him since 2013. He’s an affable locker room presence that’s been a fit in the B’s system, and one that won’t change amid competition.
“The way I am is just the way I am,” Khudobin cracked. “A lot of people always say I’m always smiling a lot, well maybe that’s a good thing. I always want to stop everything and I hate to lose.”
In ping-pong and in net.
Ty Anderson has been covering the National Hockey League for HockeyBuzz.com since 2010, has been a member of the Pro Hockey Writers Association's Boston Chapter since 2013, and can also be read in the New England Hockey Journal magazine. Contact him on Twitter or send him an email at Ty.AndersonHB[at]gmail.com.
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