Double Indemnity

Martin Gerber and Cristobal Huet have played before on the same sheet of ice, although in slightly different capacities from their current jobs as backups in the comparatively tame NHL.

Four years ago, they were on opposing teams in the Swiss National League, where games are played in front of 5,000 fans, most of them vocal, a few beyond boisterous.

Fans were once so upset at one of Huet’s games, they wanted to toss everything but the kitchen sink on the ice. They settled instead for throwing a toilet lid, Huet recalls with a slight grin.

It’s easy to smile for the Mighty Ducks’ Gerber and the Kings’ Huet, who have taken nearly congruent paths to the NHL.

They are similar in age, Gerber 29, Huet 28; draft position, Huet seventh round, 2001, Gerber, eighth round, 2001; and in hailing from countries more known for foodstuffs than goaltenders, Huet from France, Gerber from Switzerland.

They have settled into being productive part timers with their respective teams, 45 miles from each other and half a world away from where they grew up.

Hockey was never a consideration for Gerber as a kid in Langnau, a town of 10,000 in Switzerland. The youngest of six children, his activities were limited to skiing and helping around the house.

Gerber is now the pride of the country, a star on the Swiss national team along with Colorado’s David Aebischer.

Yet Gerber didn’t seek the sport. His oldest sibling, Thomas, pushed him in that direction, more or less kicking him out of the house.

“He told me to go do something,” Gerber said. “There wasn’t much to do in my hometown except play hockey. I was 12, so I got started late. I went and practiced a couple times as a player, and I was a horrible skater. I couldn’t play at all. But they had a goalie missing the next season. They asked me, and I said I would try it.”

From those humble beginnings, when he used borrowed equipment, sprang one of the better backup goalies in the NHL. Gerber has rarely failed to deliver for the Ducks. He had a 1.95 goals-against average and .929 save percentage last season, numbers that were better than Jean-Sebastien Giguere’s.

This season, Gerber has been a vital safety net. When Giguere struggled out of the gate, Gerber stepped in and had a 3-1-1 record in October and gave up only seven goals in those five starts. In early December, he won back-to-back games, one a shutout against Dallas.

Gerber made his giant leap when the Ducks selected him in the 2001 draft. He was getting a much later start than most goalies, but the Ducks liked the raw material. He played in Sweden’s elite league in 2001-02 and helped Farjestads win the championship.

And Gerber expanded his horizons.

“I never really expected to go to the NHL,” he said. “But the last four years, possibilities opened up. I saw I had a chance.”

Huet got his big chance with the Kings last off-season, when Jamie Storr and Felix Potvin were not re-signed. The Kings traded for Roman Cechmanek and handed the No. 2 job to Huet, who’d managed to squeeze in a 4-4-1 record last season mainly because Potvin was sidelined toward the end with a sprained knee.

Huet, from St. Martin d’Heres, a picturesque town of 37,000, is one of only a few French-born players to make the NHL. Like Gerber, he credits an older brother, Antoine, with getting him started in the sport. And like Gerber, he has been a solid insurance policy for the Kings, who have been without Cechmanek for the better part of a month because of a hip injury.

Huet’s record -- 4-6-5 with a 2.51 goals-against average -- is less a reflection of his ability than a short-staffed King defensive corps hampered by injury and inexperience.

“Huet has been everything we’ve expected,” Coach Andy Murray said. “He challenges our shooters to be better in practice because he works so hard. Our players really respect him a great deal because of his work ethic.”

Huet played for France in the 1998 and 2002 Olympics, earning the praise of the late Herb Brooks, who coached France at Nagano in 1998. Murray, an associate coach for Canada in 1998, remembers talking with Brooks about Huet after the 2001 draft. Brooks, who’d coached the U.S. Olympic team to the gold medal in 1980 at Lake Placid, had coached the Pittsburgh Penguins in 1999-2000.

“I remember him telling me that he tried to tell the Pittsburgh people they should have drafted him,” Murray said. “He said the guy’s a good talent and a good person.”

Huet, a virtual unknown to King fans until late last season, has helped plug the gap left when Cechmanek was injured last month.

“I never knew how long he was going to be out,” said Huet, who has played in 11 of the Kings’ last 12 games. “The fatigue isn’t a big deal, but it’s tougher mentally. That’s the only thing that changes, being used a lot from being used once in a while.”