Teams with the best goalie tandems will prevail in the NHL in 2020-21

Elite goaltending tandems will rule the day in the NHL in 2020-21.

There are still many questions to be answered about the 2020-21 NHL season but, with a truncated schedule likely, there will be more pressure on netminders than ever before.

More specifically, there will be more onus on teams to fully utilize both parts of their goalie tandems in order to navigate a congested schedule and ensure that the most important player on the ice is as fresh as possible.

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Therefore, those teams that have invested smart money into two goalies capable of taking on the starting job will no doubt prevail in what will be another strange and unprecedented season.

It has been common knowledge for a while that the days of a traditional starting goalie getting 60 or more starts in a single season is well and truly over, with the era of splitting the workload well and truly upon us.

Given the increase in travel throughout the league and the sheer increase in back-to-backs, front offices and coaching staffs now put a lot of thinking and a lot of strategy into how to exactly map out a bullet proof plan for their netminders.

It has almost become an exact science and an art form in the modern-day NHL, with the ultimate mission to ensure that elite starters don’t flame out or suffer complete burnout by the time the postseason comes round.

As such, it is much more common these days to see backups, or 1B goalies, to share the load and carry a lot more of the burden and especially down the stretch with the most important time of the year in mind.

I mean, go on a whistle stop tour around the NHL today and you will see a plethora of examples of teams riding with a goalie tandem that effectively features two NHL caliber starters.

The Dallas Stars, who reached the Stanley Cup Final in 2019-20, are a perfect example with Ben Bishop and Anton Khudobin, as are the Boston Bruins who boast one of the best tandems in the league in Tuukka Rask and Jaroslav Halak.

It is a method that has been executed perfectly by the New York Islanders for a few years now, who found great success with Robin Lehner and Thomas Greiss before swapping Lehner with Semyon Varlamov, and still not missing a beat.

Take the Philadelphia Flyers, too, who have finally unearthed their franchise goaltender in Carter Hart, but have still had the sense to add an insurance policy behind the young stud in veteran Brian Elliott.

Even the Montreal Canadiens, who have been guilty of riding Carey Price for far too long, have seen sense and traded assets to the St. Louis Blues for Jake Allen, before signing the reliable goalie to a two-year, $5,750,000 contract.

That perhaps best epitomizes the current tandem movement in the NHL, with the Canadiens well known for their over reliance on Price, so it tells you something when they too bring in help for their undisputed No. 1 starter.

The Vegas Golden Knights are another prime example after they traded for 2018-19 Vezina Trophy finalist Robin Lehner at the Trade Deadline to partner up with future Hall of Famer Marc-Andre Fleury.

However, Lehner would go on to become the leading man for the Golden Knights in the 2019-20 Stanley Cup Playoffs, while both Halak and Khudobin stepped in admirably for their teams after Rask opted out and Bishop went down hurt.

And that’s the added advantage to having an elite tandem made up of two goalies you can rely on; not only can you split the workload between the two but, if one goes down hurt, then you aren’t left in no man’s land because you have a 1B option you can call upon who is ready to go and isn’t going in cold because he’s already got a good body of work behind him.

Because, after all, it is no secret that if you don’t have good goaltending in the National Hockey League, then you won’t succeed. End of.

So, with it looking likely that the 2020-21 NHL season will resemble more of a marathon than a sprint, it will never be more important than now to have an elite goalie tandem you can ride with, split the workload right down the middle and, more importantly, have two high-end netminders that you can rely on night in and night out.

For those lucky teams that have just that, then that could well be their recipe for ultimate success on the golden-laden path to the Stanley Cup in a season that will look like none other.