The Penguins will be making a goaltending change... at the coaching position. They seem content with bringing back the same goalie duo

Ron Hextall: "When you're a goaltender, there's disappointments that you have to get over and bounce back from. I feel strongly that Tristan's going to bounce back and be a strong goaltender for us." pic.twitter.com/F8c5hCWFYx

— Taylor Haase (@TaylorHaasePGH) August 5, 2021

It will be Andy Chiodo coming in to replace Mike Buckley

The Penguins have named Andy Chiodo as the team’s goaltending coach.

Mike Buckley, the team’s goaltending coach from 2017-2021, has been relieved of his duties.

Details: https://t.co/Il6T4OKaPl pic.twitter.com/c7Hy34TiU3

— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) August 4, 2021

Mike Buckley’s tenure as the Penguins goaltending coach looked innocent enough if you look at the regular season numbers. The Penguins ranked 13th overall in save percentage 2017-21 at .907. At 5v5 they were also 13th at .920. The playoffs were an entirely different animal. The Penguins ranked 25th out of 28 teams at 5v5 at .902. In all-situations in the playoffs, they were 22nd out of 28 at .895. Now I’m not here to blame Mike Buckley for the huge drop, but it is tough to look at Matt Murray under Mike Bales and Matt Murray away from Mike Bales and not start to think a goaltender coach might influence performance.

In 2015-17 Matt Murray was .934 in the regular season and 14 goals saved above average at 5v5. In all-situations it was .925 and 18.45 goals saved above average. The playoffs were .925 in all-situations and 8.27 goals saved above average. At 5v5 it was .934 and 4.10. It was after the 2017 season Mike Bales moved on to Carolina. It was also when Matt Murray stopped being an upper end dependable starter. From 2017-21 Matt Murray did have a .916 save percentage at 5v5, but his goals saved above average sank dramatically to –15.77. In all-situations it was .907 and –15.88. In the 1,146 playoff minutes he’s played in all-situations since parting ways with Bales it is .908 and –4.03. At 5v5 he is .905 with a GSAA of –8.72. Those both rank 24 out of 24 goalies who have played 500 minutes in the playoffs since 2018.

Specialized coaching isn’t something easy to assess from the outside looking in. Although, the results post-Mike Bales haven't been great for Matt Murray or the Penguins, specifically the playoffs. Perhaps, it is all coincidental and correlation not equating causation, but the Penguins do have a history of being neglectful of the goaltending coaching position. Gilles Meloche may very well have been one of the worst goaltending coaches during his tenure as Penguins goaltending coach. In fact, I think the lack of a proper goalie coach robbed Marc-Andre Fleury of his true potential. Something I don't think is a coincidence is that Fleury’s horrible run of playoff goaltending turned a corner after the 2013 season when Meloche tendered his resignation. After a run of atrocious goaltending the Penguins saw a resurgence when Meloche left and Bales took over.

In the playoffs from 2010-13 the Penguins ranked 23rd out of 24 teams with an .890 save percentage in all-situations. They were 24th in HDSV% at .731. We know how bad things were then. From 2014-17 things improved to .922 and with a HDSV% of .822. The run of goaltending Pittsburgh received in both the 2016 and 2017 playoffs from both Matt Murray and Marc-Andre Fleury was superb.

I think the move away from Mike Buckley was due. I have no idea if Andy Chiodo can turn Tristan Jarry into a true #1 goaltender, but he’ll have to. For the Penguins they should hope Chiodo is more Mike Bales than Gilles Meloche.

Thanks for reading!

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