KUEMPER RAISING HIS GAME
Dec 24, 2013KUEMPER RAISING HIS GAME
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Iowawild.com
Just a matter of confidence.
That’s how Iowa Wild goalie Darcy Kuemper explains how he and his teammates have staged an early season turnaround from near a disastrous month-long slump.
“Good players are consistent because when things don’t go well, they don’t let it affect them,” Kuemper said in a recent interview. “They choose to believe they can do it. You have to know and decide that you are still the same guy you were when things were going well.”
Kuemper should know.
After a rocky and somewhat tumultuous early season that included getting pulled in the second period of the only NHL game he has started so far this season for Minnesota, Kuemper has started to round himself into the kind of goalie the Iowa Wild can ride back into playoff contention.
Since returning to Iowa in late November after spending a month going up and down Interstate 35 to the Twin Cities, Kuemper has improved his game markedly. Prior to returning to Iowa on Nov. 27, Kuemper had a 2.80 GAA and a .907 save percentage with a 3-7 record. Since then, Kuemper has a 1.81 GAA and .953 save percentage with a 4-3 record.
The Wild also started winning. A big 4-2 win at Abbotsford began a stretch of success that has given the team a 4-0-1 streak with two more home games remaining in December.
Kurt Kleinendorst, Iowa’s head coach, said that Kuemper’s improvement has matched the club’s overall progression over the past several weeks.
“Other than one or two nights when I didn’t think we played to our potential, I thought we were playing pretty well. We just weren’t getting the results,” Kleinendorst said. “I think sometimes the difference between winning and losing is that feeling. It is a confidence thing to be sure.”
Kuemper suggested that he, along with the rest of the Wild team, began second guessing themselves while in the throes of an unfortunate eight-game home losing streak.
“When a team is not having success, especially as a goalie, you start to overthink things,” Kuemper said. “You ask what am I doing wrong? Why is this happening to me?”
Kuemper also attributed some of the problems to the fact the team has a new head coach, a roster that changed by nearly 50 percent from last year and relocated from Houston to Des Moines. Kuemper said that none of those factors should be used as an excuse, but suggested in a sport like hockey where routine change can cause players to struggle in the early stages of a season.
“With a new coach and new players, it takes a while to establish chemistry and to get comfortable with each other,” Kuemper said. “In addition, we had a new city to learn about so everything took a while before we got into a routine. There was a lot of new to deal with.”
Several trips to Minnesota during October and November clearly disrupted Kuemper’s routine. His only start for the NHL Wild resulted in getting pulled in the second period in a loss at Toronto
“I had been pulled before and I knew I would be fine, but it also was first time I had been pulled in an NHL game and that’s a little different. You never know how many opportunities you are going to get,” he said, attributing his problems to “not getting myself into the game.”
More humorously, Kuemper’s other vivid memory of his time with Minnesota this year was when he was sitting in the Winnipeg airport waiting to fly back to Des Moines. Kuemper had accompanied the NHL Wild to play against the Jets, but goalies Nicklas Backstrom and Josh Harding were both put on the roster.
As a result, Kuemper was sent back to Iowa while the NHL club got ready to play the Jets.
“I had already gone through customs and was sitting at the gate waiting to board the plane,” Kuemper said. “Then my cell phone went off.”
The call was from a team official who told Kuemper that Harding injured himself in pre-game warm-ups ordered him back the Winnipeg arena.
“The first thing that went through my mind was – is that even possible? I don’t know how to do that. How do I get my gear?“ Kuemper said.
After retrieving his luggage, Kuemper walked out of the airport where the large and empty Minnesota team bus was waiting for him.
“I got back with two minutes left in the first period, got my gear on.” he said. “The funny thing was that as I was skating toward to the bench, they started waving me away. There is a rule I couldn’t be on the bench. So I stayed by the gate and watched the game like a fan.”
Kuemper said that as he returned to Iowa after the Winnipeg trip, he decided to stop worrying about his early season problems. Calling it a “big turning point for me,” Kuemper said that decision helped him to stop overthinking his game.
“The result has been that it is going good for me since I got back,” he said. “Just because we have had a few losses doesn’t mean we don’t know how to play hockey.”
Kuemper’s simple approach has served him well as he has risen quickly through minor league hockey.
While many goalies are notorious for odd sometimes bizarre pre-game routines and superstitions, Kuemper’s approach is simple and direct. He reads a book, takes a nap and then listens to music once he arrives at the arena before a game.
His approach to this season is just as matter-of-fact. Whether it’s the Iowa Wild’s early season problems or his own future, the 23-year-old Saskatoon native says a short memory and confidence are the keys to success for himself and his teammates, who are trying to recover from a dismal 3-9 record in November.
Unlike most young hockey players with NHL potential, Kuemper, whose father is a Saskatoon police officer and mother is an accountant, began playing major Junior A hockey (Red Deer) at age 18 not 16 in 2008-09. But the 6-foot, 3-inch, 195-pound goalie almost immediately drew the attention of scouts with a 2.93 GAA in his first season.
As a result, he became the Minnesota Wild’s sixth round draft choice (#161 choice) in the 2009 NHL entry draft and even played in four games with the Houston Aeros in 2010 and won two of them. In 2011, Kuemper signed a three-year $2.7 million contract with the Wild, according to CapGeek.com., and will become a restricted free agent in 2014-15.
Now, Kuemper is the midst of a season that began well, went bad for a stretch, but now is showing signs of recovery. When Iowa defeated league leading Abbotsford 4-2 on the road with back-up goalie Johann Gustaffson in the nets, Kuemper said that the victory provided the club with a booster shot of confidence.
Kuemper followed with one of his best performances of the season stopping 37 of 38 shots against Rockford to help lead Iowa to a 3-1 win that broke the club’s home losing streak.
“It wasn’t just that we won the Abbotsford game, but how we won the game,” Kuemper said. “We took the game over and began to control it. And, the fact that we did it against one of the top teams in the conference made it that much better.”
Kleinendorst, the Wild’s head coach, said that Kuemper’s continued development is key to the club being successful this season.
“Success always starts with the goalie,” Kleinendorst said. “We are no different than any other team in the sense that that guy who is between the pipes is always the most important guy.” He added that Kuemper, along with back-up Johann Gustaffson, will play a key role if Iowa is to recover from their November slump.
“He has to be on his game every night and for us, in particular, because we don’t score a lot of goals. We absolutely have to have him in that place.”