Andrei Vasilevski is the best goalkeeper in the world, above all through mental toughness. The most recent example of this came in the third game of the Stanley Cup final series.
The NHL finals will continue on Saturday morning Finnish time. will show all the finals live. The broadcast from the 5th final of the Colorado-Tampa Bay Series will begin at 3 p.m.
Andrei Vasilevski wanted to Tampa Bay. At the summer 2012 booking ceremony, Tampa’s then GM Steve Yzermanapulais-GM Julien Brisebois as well as other club leadership invited the Russian to a meeting.
Vasilevski did not speak English, so he had an interpreter with him to handle the meeting.
Vasilevski focused on drawing.
When the meeting was over, the club management turned to the Russian player, asking if he would like to show what he had drawn throughout the meeting.
Vasilevski took his paper and turned it over: he had drawn a hockey goalie mask with the Tampa Bay Lightning logo on it.
The Siberian man wanted the heat of Florida.
This also got the heat of Florida, as a little later that weekend, Tampa Bay booked Andrei Vasilevski, who has since become the best goalkeeper in the world, as the 19th player in the first round.
Since then, only four goalkeepers have been booked for the NHL in the first round.
Equally, all the booking was one indication of Vasilevsky’s carefully guarded, even fun, character that few have a touch with.
– He throws one-liners that make the guys laugh. Or you might be in the locker room hallway doing an interview when he comes behind you to fool around. He takes great care of his privacy, but we’ve seen glimpses of his funny personality, The Athletic’s Tampa editor Joe Smith says Sport.
Vasilevsky’s playing and strengths have been dismantled into atoms numerous times, but few know anything about his personality. This is very common in the NHL for Russian players because of the language barrier.
– Everything shows that family is an important value for him, as is religion. He’s a very religious guy who gets a balance of the time he plays with his family, Smith opens.
In hard places at best
It is true that Andrei Vasilevsky has not been out of balance in recent years. After two consecutive Stanley Cups and the trophy of one of the most valuable players in the playoffs, Vasilevski is on his way to becoming the best goalkeeper in hockey history.
Vasilevsky’s ability to respond to weak games or individual easier goals sets him apart from others.
Sure, Vasilevski is big and technically almost flawless, but the hardness of the mental side is second to none.
It is the spiritual side that the Russian has systematically developed over the years, for example through meditation. The results have been mute.
In the previous three years, Vasilevski has won 19 of 21 matches after losing games.
Vasilevski has conceded only two goals in the last three years in a series-breaking match.
– We can learn a lot from him. In terms of mental toughness, he’s the hardest player I’ve ever played with, a Tampa defender Mikhail Sergatsev says.
– His grip in the playoffs and especially in the decision-making moments of the match series, speaks for itself. His payout after the losing games is tremendous to read. He has an incredible ability to stand out at important moments and that makes him one of the best of all time, Smith compels.
The latest example of Vasilevsky’s strength came from the third game in the ongoing final series. After the 0–7 crush in Denver, the Russian was once again the best player on his team in a 6-2 win over the triple.
The important battles of the opening round kept Tampa at play and the end was a familiar history.
– His spiritual growth has been incomprehensible in recent years. The loss is always hard to swallow and especially the 0–7 loss hurts, but even in 2014–2015, such a loss would have derailed him for a longer period of time. Now he immediately bounced back to the top, the Tampa pilot Jon Cooper praise.
Tampa lost the fourth final and is now back against the wall in the match series. The defeat means Colorado is celebrating the championship.
Vasilevsky, if anyone, can still translate this series.
The importance of Vasilevski to Tampa cannot be underestimated. While the team is bursting with top-notch individual skills and superstars, there is no individual in the group more important than the goalkeeper.
Vasilevski has won an incredible number of matches over the past three spring with his personal contribution to his team.
– He’s the backbone of everything in Tampa. He gives tremendous confidence to the team because the players know that the goalkeeper behind them often places mistakes on the field. Vasilevski is the biggest reason for Tampa’s two consecutive championships, a journalist for the Tampa Tribune Erik Erlendsson line.
In Colorado, hands full
Colorado, too, knows exactly what kind of goalkeeper challenge it faces. The team’s Finnish goalkeeper coach Jussi Parkkila did not spare his working hours trying to dig out everything possible from Vasilevsky.
– It was the most challenging project I have done and yes I knew it was going to be difficult now. However, there is a pretty good goalkeeper in front of him. I looked at all the goals scored for Vasilevsky this season and last year as well. There were a few clips in it to pile up. Quite a lot of working hours came, Parkkila laughed at Sport in Denver.
Colorado Finnish Pier Artturi Lehkonen has read Parkkila’s monitoring reports carefully.
– Of course, we try to use all the information Jussi gets. When you get to the finish line in the game, you don’t have much time to think about it, but you have that preconception in your back. Vasilevski is a large-sized miller who moves the sprinkler well. There is no situation where he is not on the road, there is always a limb in front, Lehkonen laughs at the end.