RoboSeal: New way to close costly RVH gaps with skate on post
Necessity is the mother of invention.
It’s a proverb that often applies to goaltending.
Just ask goaltending coach Josh Robinson and goalie Ken Appleby, who together developed a new way for Appleby to seal the post in reverse-VH last season with the Florida Everblades in the ECHL, after identifying some gaps in Appleby’s coverage using skate-on-post during training camp.
It’s not an uncommon problem, either. Appleby, who played three games with the New Jersey Devils in 2017-18, is 6-foot-4 with long limbs and prefers to go into RVH — and perhaps more importantly, is better coming out of RVH — with his skate on the post. And that often leaves holes, not only between the bottom of the pad and post, but also a triangle formed above the pad between the pants and post because he has to lean so far back over those long legs.
You can see both holes in this photo from the Everblades first pre-season game:
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Robinson got down on the goal line with a camera to show Appleby exactly how bad the gap was — and what he said in that moment, and the fix they built from it, is below.
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