THEY'RE HURTING

By ELLIOTT TEAFORD and ROBYN NORWOOD

May 6, 1997 12 AM PT

Share via
- Email
- Facebook
- X
- LinkedIn
- Threads
- Reddit
- WhatsApp

TIMES STAFF WRITER

They swarmed Mighty Duck goaltender Mikhail Shtalenkov again Monday, surrounding him, peppering him, trying to catch him off guard.

Are you ready to fill in for Guy Hebert again tonight?

About triple overtime Sunday, were you nervous? Excited?

Can you play well again?

Hebert won’t play in Game 3 against the Detroit Red Wings tonight at the Pond after straining his groin in Game 2. His status is day to day as the Ducks try to rally from a two-game deficit in their best-of-seven Western Conference semifinal series.

“It’s day to day, but [today] is not the day,” Duck Coach Ron Wilson said. “I’m not going to stick a goalie in because he wants to play and is 90%.”

So, Shtalenkov, 31, will start his first Stanley Cup playoff game with the Ducks down but defiant after two overtime losses.

The Ducks won’t have to try to win without right wing Teemu Selanne, who has a deeply bruised left calf after Detroit’s Kirk Maltby slashed him in Game 2. Selanne is expected to play.

Bad news is that feisty defenseman David Karpa is sidelined for the rest of the playoffs because of a torn chest muscle.

“We’re not even skipping a beat here,” Wilson said. “It’s one shot that has made the difference in two overtime games.”

Only a few players skated Monday after Sunday’s exhausting 5 1/2-hour marathon. Shtalenkov watched a videotape of his performance, then calmly explained his 54-minute 29-second relief appearance in Sunday’s 3-2 triple-overtime loss.

“I was a little nervous . . . it was the third period . . . I didn’t expect anything like that,” Shtalenkov said. “I was thinking Guy wanted to take a break for a minute. Then my heart started to beat very often.”

Then, the Red Wings started shooting very often.

Forty shots, from the time Shtalenkov replaced Hebert at the 7:02 mark of the third period until Vyacheslav Kozlov won it for the Red Wings at 1:31 of the third overtime period.

“In overtime, you are not thinking about anything at all,” Shtalenkov said. “I just tried to play. I’m maybe not going to think about [Sunday’s] game or the March game [a 1-0 shutout over the Red Wings at Joe Louis Arena]. I’ll keep it simple and do the right things. That’s what I’ll try [tonight].”

Until now, the highlight of Shtalenkov’s career was winning the gold medal for the Commonwealth of Independent States--the former Soviet Union--in the 1992 Albertville Olympics.

“I remember great feelings after the game,” he said. “It was probably my biggest game in my career, the biggest tournament in my career. I have played in three World Championships, but I remember most the Olympics.”

He left Moscow after the Olympics and played with the Milwaukee Admirals of the International Hockey League before the Ducks drafted him in the fifth round in 1993.

The last three seasons, Hebert has edged out Shtalenkov for the No. 1 goaltending spot. Despite a 7-8-1 record, two shutouts and a 2.89 goals-against average in the regular season, Shtalenkov’s name never has rolled off the tongues of fans or public address announcers. (Say it: Shtah-LEHN-koff).

But the Red Wings and their five Russian stars know him well. Plus, there was his 1-0 victory March 30 against them at Detroit.

Detroit goalie Mike Vernon remembered that game, and he didn’t relax when Shtalenkov came in with the score tied, 1-1, on Sunday.

“I knew he was a good goaltender,” said Vernon, who played all 101 minutes 31 seconds and made 49 saves. “Everybody always says, ‘Take some long shots, test him.’ But sometimes that just gets a goalie into it. We took some from the red line, and I think that got him in the game.”

Said Francois Allaire, Duck goaltending consultant: “He’s a great reliever. Some guys have that capability, some guys don’t. I think it’s part of your personality, to be like that. Some guys don’t have that sense of urgency.”

That was obvious Sunday to Detroit Coach Scotty Bowman.

“It happened to me once in St. Louis when a goalie got injured,” Bowman said. “Glenn Hall had to leave a game and we brought in Jacques Plante. We had a shutout going and he came in and kept it going.”

Hall and Plante are NHL legends. Shtalenkov is more familiar with Vladislav Tretiak, hero of many Russian Olympic triumphs.

As a youngster, Shtalenkov tried to copy Tretiak’s goaltending style.

“You know, like kids in Canada or the U.S. would call themselves Paul Kariya or Teemu Selanne while playing,” Shtalenkov said.

Will they someday do the same with Shtalenkov?

“Why not?” he said. “I’m not that bad sometimes.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

NHL PLAYOFFS

TONIGHT’S GAME

MIGHTY DUCKS vs. RED WINGS

Red Wings lead series, 2-0

* Time: 7:30

* TV: FSW, FSW2