Goalie Positioning

Goal tending is the art of stopping the puck from going into the net at all cost. In this blog we will be looking at the different techniques of goal tending.

The butterfly technique became popular in the 1980 and is widely used today. The goalie stands with feet a little wider then his/her shoulders and the knees are held close together to form a inverted V shape. The goalie stays square to the shooter  and drops to his/her knees as soon as the puck is fired at them. His/her leg at this point should be out on each side and the five hole closed with arms tucked in tight to their sides. The advantage of this position is that when the goalie drops there legs are extended out and this covers the majority of the net. The biggest advantage is that you can go down fast and back up quickly in this type of form. Shots to the upper areas are the weakest part of the butterfly technique.


The stand up technique is when the goalie is in a slight crouch position in the net and he stays up instead of going down. In the stand up technique the goalie depends on his/her skating ability and talent to slide from one side of the net to the other side in a matter of seconds. The goalie must challenge the shooter by cutting off the angle and making the goal look as small as possible.  The goalie uses his size to cut off the angle of the shooter and creating a bad shoot. A stand up goalie must be a good skater and can skate out of the crease to make plays on the puck. He/she must be very athletic and move very quickly to make saves. The outside corners can cause him/her problems along with low shots because the bottom portion of the net is largely uncovered.


The hybrid technique uses a combination of the butterfly and the stand up techniques to stop the puck. The goaltender usually starts in the stand up position and then drops down when the puck goes from one side of the net to the other side. This technique is largely dependent on instinctive moves. He/she reacts according to what he/she thinks the shooter is going to do to get the puck in the net.

The flopper style is for goaltenders committed to stopping the puck at all costs. He/she must be a top rated athlete with tremendous quickness. He/she may use their body or they may flop around on the ice to get their glove, skate or anything else in front of the puck to stop it from going in the net. All this commotion frustrates the shooter so that he/she misses the goal.

These are just a few goalie techniques. The goalie should always decide what technique feels best to their way of saving the puck.