Visentin: The Right Call for Canada

It wasn’t much of a surprise when Dave Cameron announced that Mark Visentin would get the start against the Americans in the semi finals.

Visentin was almost assured the job after Olivier Roy’s poor performance in Canada’s shootout loss to the Swedes (.857 save % in the game) on New Year’s Eve. All Visentin had to do was beat the Swiss. Which shouldn’t have been a problem considering the Canadians rolled over the Swiss, 8-0, in their first pre-tournament game.

However, when things appear the easiest, that’s when they are the most difficult.

Visentin allowed an ugly goal on one of the first shots he faced on Monday night.

“You draw your plan up with your team and you dissect it,” explained Cameron after the Canadian victory. “But one thing you can’t practice or know the response to is pressure. I thought giving up that first goal; you’re going to be able to see how he handles pressure and I though he did quite well.”

Cameron is very familiar with Visentin’s play. His Mississauga St. Micheal’s Majors have faced Visentin’s Niagara Ice Dogs four times already this year in the OHL. Visentin has started in three of those games. Even though Visentin lost all three games he was always the busier of the two goalies and allowed two or fewer goals.

The change in net was also a wake up call for the rest of the players. They know that their defensive zone play wasn’t good enough and because of that they’re partially responsible for the switch.

“I think it gives us momentum,” said Sean Couturier. “We have confidence in both goalies and we’ll play the same whether it’s Olivier or Mark. We didn’t really help Olivier in his last game and we have to refocus on our d-zone.”

In Visentin the Canadians have a goalie that has only lost four games in regulation in 21 starts for Niagara this year. He leads the league with 2.30 goals-against-average and his .921 save percentage is good enough for third in the OHL.

“Whoever is in net I think we’re excited about it,” said Cody Eaking. “We’re confident in them and that they’re going to do their job.”

The only knock against Visentin so far this season is that once a game he’ll allow a soft goal. He may only allow two goals in the game but one will leave you scratching your head.

Canada will need him to shake that tonight against the Americans. Jack Campbell, the American goalie, has saved his best play for this tournament. He leads the WJC with a sparkling .956 sv% and a very stingy 1.03 GAA. Whereas in the OHL this season his numbers are quite the opposite his .887 sv% has him 22 out of 28 OHL goalies and his 3.68 GAA has him in 20th.

Cameron did the right thing by switching his goalies. He knows all to well what can happen if you stick with a cold goalie. Cameron was an assistant at last year’s WJC in Saskatchewan. Jake Allen had struggled in the tournament but was left in to start the gold medal game. He allowed five goals on 28 shots before being replaced by Martin Jones.

Canada is hoping that the early goalie switch will prevent history from repeating itself tonight.