Canada’s goaltender Jake Allen has been on the upswing since his National Hockey League debut, and his struggles are pretty hard to ignore.

The veteran has dropped his last six decisions, including his two most recent this week. On Monday, the Colorado Avalanche defeated him six times in 15 shots and an 8-4 loss. Then the Florida Panthers gave him a hard time replacing Samuel Montembeault in the first half and scoring six goals in 18 throws. Ineffectively, he also returned to the bench, which he occupied 9-5 in the losing game.

Allen flinched 12 times in about 45 minutes of play. These are the underperformances that hurt his stats for the season, specifically his save rate (.892) and goals-against average (3.56). However, he refuses to give in to discouragement.

“Obviously it wasn’t a good game by me or the team. I take my responsibility. […] It was a weird start to the game for both teams, but it wasn’t enough for me. I have to put that behind me and react properly, he said in a press conference after training on Friday. The boys will be ready to recover.”

Despite the horrible Thursday night, there’s no question of reviewing this horror film to find out what went wrong technically.

“You don’t watch the video for this type of match. 98-99% of the time you’re doing your homework for the next game, but that’s the kind of game you throw away and forget,” he said.

Work

Allen insists on the importance of making a daily effort to get out of the doldrums. There is simply no magic recipe.

“It’s about being myself. I show up for work at the arena every day, I don’t really take my time. I’m trying to get involved to be the best version of myself and to help this group. This was not the case yesterday. In my eyes you have to look to the next day,” he said.