Playoffs a ‘new beginning’ for Carter Hart and the Silvertips

Published 1:30 am Thursday, March 23, 2017

EVERETT — Don’t ask Carter Hart to reflect, not yet anyway.

Not on coming back from the NHL draft nine months ago after being the first goaltender selected. Not on a season that yielded his Everett Silvertips their fifth U.S. Division banner. Not on an 18-year-old season that was even better than his 17-year-old campaign, the one in which he was named WHL and CHL Goaltender of the Year.

“The season isn’t over,” Hart said in the bowels of Xfinity Arena on Thursday on the eve of Game 1 of the WHL Western Conference quarterfinals, where the top-seeded Silvertips take on eighth-seeded Victoria.

“A new season is just beginning here with the playoffs, so I’m really not too worried about that,” he continued. “I think when it’s all over, then it’s time to reflect on the year, but right now it’s a new beginning.”

Hart won’t look back at the numbers, the accolades or a potential future with the Philadelphia Flyers, and that should give Everett Silvertips fans the opportunity to exhale in relief.

A goalie has to “live in the moment” more than any other player on the ice, particularly during the postseason. So much pressure is applied and so many eyeballs are focused on the net-minder that he can’t afford to expend mental energy on anything other than stopping the next puck.

“Right now it’s go time,” Hart said. “It’s hard to believe (the draft) was almost already a year ago, but right now 100 percent of my focus is right here and we have a goal and task here. That goal is to win a Memorial Cup and that takes a lot of hard work. Its one of the hardest trophies to win in sports.”

Everett puts an impressive defensive unit in front of Hart. Renowned for getting their sticks in passing lanes and dropping to the ice to block shots, the blue-line sextet deserves some credit for yet another exceptional season for Hart.

“There are a lot of ice packs and a lot of treatment after games for guys because they’re willing to block shots and they’re willing to go to the dirty areas and they’re willing to put their bodies on the line,” Hart said. “That’s why I think we came out in first place in the U.S. Division.”

But if the Tips are going to make a deep postseason run and reach their first Memorial Cup Tournament, it’s going to start with Hart in net. The Sherwood Park, Alberta, native is the cornerstone of Everett’s league-best defense that allows just 2.35 goals per game and boasts the league’s stingiest penalty kill.

Hart boasts league bests in save percentage (.927), goals-against average (1.99) and shutouts (nine). All top last year’s marks and he is again the Western Conference nominee for Goaltender of the Year.

“I think we just play with that much more confidence when we know that he’s going to get the job done,” Tips defenseman Kevin Davis said.

Even if Hart won’t reflect, his coaches and teammates will. There were still teachable moments in a season as stellar as the one Hart turned in. Back in October, Hart allowed two goals in the first period in a 2-1 loss at Spokane. A night later in Kelowna, he surrendered two goals in the first 7:50 and was yanked after facing just five shots.

“Up until then, he hadn’t been absolutely perfectly brilliant,” Silvertips coach Kevin Constantine said. “So I think he even had to recognize that of all the positives that had happened, you still on a daily basis gotta put the work in to be great. You don’t get to put average work in and expect great results, so there was even a little bit of a learning curve on his part, but he handled all that. And so he has gotten better.”

Look no further than Everett’s next game on Oct. 22 when Hart turned in his best performance of the season to that juncture with a 37-save effort in a 3-1 win at Victoria.

In the words of Constantine it was “a very professional response.”

That is the sort of performance the Tips will look for beginning tonight when the Royals visit Xfinity Arena for a 7:35 p.m. puck drop. If Everett has its way, the postseason won’t end until late May, and only then will Hart take the chance to look back and reflect on what will surely be his penultimate junior hockey season.

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