Wilson Turns Up the Heat on Goaltenders

The dressing room door swung open, offering a few brave reporters passage into the inner sanctum of the Legion of Doom. There they found Eric Lindros, unarmed, except for a devious grin and a booming blast of the larynx.

“So,” Lindros called out, his loud chortle filling the room, “did the duck make it?”

A few feet down the corridor, Anaheim Coach Ron Wilson was wondering much the same thing.

“Did Wild Wing survive?” Wilson asked.

Such is the state of Mighty Duck hockey, six games into the 1995-96 season. The Ducks get blown out on national TV, drop to 1-5, suffer numerous neck sprains craning to look the Philadelphia Flyers in the eye, hear a rumor Lindros scored a monstrous goal in the first period--none of them could see it--and the main concern after the game is the personal well-being of the home team’s pyrotechnically challenged mascot.

Yes, yes, Wild Wing lives. Orange County, and the rest of the cable-viewing country, can sleep easy. The pigeon-toed duck that dominated Wednesday night’s sports news by nearly turning a daredevil pregame leap over a wall of fire into a block party barbecue, was back on the ice Friday evening. Milking the best P.R. stunt Disney never thought up (or did they?--hmm, one has to wonder), the Mighty Ducks pushed their mascot onto the rink in a wheelchair, then had him throw off his hospital greens, then had him approach the treacherous ramp one more time.

Only this time with no wall of fire.

Safe and sane entertainment, you understand.

So Wild Wing leaped over . . . well, nothing, really. Nothing beneath him except frightening frozen water. Wild Wing, the Eddie The Eagle of hockey mascots, completed this jump, landing firmly on both skates as hundreds of kids in the building yawned and tugged at a parent’s elbow, “It was a lot better with the raging inferno.”

Then the real Ducks went out to confront a hurdle known as the Philadelphia Flyers, undefeated after five games, having outscored those first few hapless foes by a cumulative 20-4.

After 15 1/2 minutes, it was Flyers 2, Ducks 0; after 38 minutes, it was 4-0; after two periods, Philadelphia had outshot the Ducks, 24-6, and Wilson was beginning to empathize with Wild Wing.

“I felt like we were going to get impaled on that fire pit,” Wilson mused.

“We came out of it singed. But at least we won’t have to come out in a wheelchair before [Sunday’s] Winnipeg game.”

No, but the Ducks may come out with a different goalie. Guy Hebert drew the short straw Friday and his were the pads thrown before the Legion of Doom. Hebert did what he could--blocked 25 shots, swung and missed on four--but Wilson was convinced Hebert could have, and should have, done more.

“I think we got psyched out by two quick, relatively soft goals,” Wilson said. “Two shots from the blue line beat him and it’s 2-0.

“You need big saves from your goaltender to win in this league. Those should have been routine stops. When you’re coming out at the start of the game and you’re battling and-- poof! --it’s in the net, it really knocks the steam out of you.

“We haven’t gotten great goaltending yet this season.”

Soft goals?

Lindros, who scored the Flyers’ second on a wrist blast that fairly impersonated a short-range bazooka, begged to differ, noticing that the puck hit the back of the net so hard, it caromed out between the faceoff circles.

“Are you trying to say that wasn’t a rocket?” Lindros asked.

Hebert said, simply, “You can’t stop what you can’t see.” Philadelphia’s first goal, pumped in by Kevin Haller from beyond the left circle, blindsided Hebert. “I didn’t see it until it hit my stick,” Hebert said. “Then, as luck would have it, it bounced off the stick and kind of dribbled in.”

As for the second goal, Lindros’, Hebert conceded, “I wasn’t happy with. I’d like to see the video on that one.

“Then again, the guy’s the league MVP. I don’t know if that’s an excuse, but I don’t know if it was soft, either.”

Hebert did give Wilson this much:

“I’ve got to pick my game up. I’ve got to make one or two more crucial saves a game.

“I’m as critical about my play as anybody. Ron doesn’t have to tell me he wasn’t happy with those goals. . . . It’s a very different view when you’re not the one standing between the pipes, but Ron can say what he wants. That’s why he has ‘Coach Wilson’ printed on his office door.”

Roasted duck. Wednesday it’s the mascot. Friday it’s the goalie.

Who will it be Sunday?

That’s part of the fun, part of the reason people continue the trek to The Pond. Say what you will about what they serve there. At least they take the care to rotate the menu.