BUFFALO – A few weeks ago, Jim Montgomery, Zemgus Girgensons’ junior coach, told me, “I know that he’s not the best in shootouts.”
Why isn’t Girgensons, whose two shootout goals have him in a five-way tie for the NHL lead, good in the one-on-one competition?
“He just comes straight down,” Montgomery said. “He’s always looking to deke his threat of a shot, and I told him that when I coached him, ‘You got to be a threat to shoot.’”
Montgomery said that Oct. 15, the day after the Sabres center scored the shootout winner in Carolina. He scored the winner again Sunday against Detroit by – you guessed it – deking.
Montgomery, of course, was just giving Girgensons some advice.
