Jun 7, 2015
Thumbs up to Vasilevskiy
TSN's Dave Hodge gives his Sunday thumbs up to Andrei Vasilevskiy for his work in relief of Ben Bishop in Game 2 of the Stanley Cup final. Hodge also extends a thumbs down to the the lack of information in the Ben Bishop-Vasilevskiy situation, and the Lightning's refusal to divulge information.
By Dave Hodge
Backup goalies are dressed for a reason. They might have to play. Thumbs up to Andrei Vasilevskiy for making five saves that had to be made.
Never mind if it had just been one save, he had to do the job he's paid to do and he had to do it under difficult and unexpected conditions, in the Stanley Cup final. And five saves might have been the easy part. It's possible he'll have to start as many as five games. His Tampa Bay teammates say they're confident in his ability to do whatever needs to be done. What else could they say? What else they may be thinking could surely include a flashback to the playoffs of a year ago, when Ben Bishop couldn't play and Anders LIndback was no match for Carey Price and the Montreal Canadiens.
This is different - it's the Stanley Cup final. The goalie is different - he's Andrei Vasilevskiy. There's no hiding the fact he's an inexperienced rookie, but he had a winning record (7-5-1) during the season and he's got a winning playoff record (1-0) for less than 10 minutes of relief work. If the Lightning need more from him, they say they'll do fine.
Nevertheless, the state of Tampa's goaltending has suddenly become the biggest Stanley Cup story, and as of yet very incomplete.
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Thumbs down to all that we don't know about the Bishop-Vasilevskiy situation.
It is quite ridiculous that those who pay with money to watch the Stanley Cup final in person, or with their time to view it on television, are kept in the dark about what they witnessed last night. The NHL and its member teams can make injury information as classified as they like, but in a case like this, with all NHL eyes watching, surely something needs to be said about what happened to Bishop.
He was either sick or hurt and what in the world was gained by refusing to acknowledge which of those two reasons took him out of the game? There's a big difference between addressing the issue without providing details and evading the issue without allowing and answering a simple question – "Was he sick or hurt?" 
And sure, there would be a follow-up - "Will he start game three?" "Maybe" would be an acceptable answer. "Yes" or "no" would be preferable if either was the case. But to treat Bishop's exit as if it never happened is wrong.
The NHL wants as much coverage of its showcase event as it can get. It deserves none if it expects those outside the Tampa Bay dressing room to accept that a key part of what went on in a Stanley Cup final game is none of their business.