In today’s society, too many hockey players are constantly being bombarded with too many distractions. This is even more of an issue for a goaltender, because we can’t succeed unless we maintain an extremely high level of intense focus.

Friends, family, and schoolwork. Cell phones, Twitter, and Facebook. Beer, girls, and house parties.

Photo Copyright Justin Goldman – The Goalie Guild

All of these things find different ways to weave their way into the fabric of our lives, yet they all eventually erode our ability to focus on what matters most; playing the game consistently, and stopping the puck with a clear mind.

It’s an irony of a goalie’s life; we spend our days trying to delete the negative impact of these distractions, yet the harder we try, the tougher it seems to accomplish. It’s a never-ending vicious cycle of battling one’s ego, and then finding the time to complete our tasks correctly, all while trying to ignore the uncontrollable situations.

Unfortunately, this is an unavoidable aspect of goaltending.

Unless we move to Antarctica or live in a submarine, we can never fully eliminate these aspects of social chemistry. It’s 2012, and these things make us human. They all collide in the dimensions of time and (cyber) space, and make up what is known as the everyday human experience.

Fortunately, for Wisconsin Badgers goaltender Landon Peterson, the lost art of mental discipline acts as the dissolvent for his distractions.

I didn’t know this before the Elite Goalies Mentorship Camp began, but high school students must have at least a 3.8 GPA in order to be accepted into the University of Wisconsin. They also need a resume chock full of extra curricular activities, or numerous community service achievements.

Basically, it’s almost impossible to get accepted, and then once you’re in, the road to earning that degree just gets tougher and tougher.

Now take that monumental task of making it in, and then slap the challenge of being a walk-on goaltender into the mix. From there, you still don’t even have a faint picture of what Landon has experienced and accomplished since March of 2011.

It’s a constant struggle to reinforce the following messages:

No distractions allowed. No straying from the path you started down. Get your shit together, man up, and reach your goals. No waffling allowed.

It really takes an extreme commitment to sweat and bleed the daily lifestyle of an NCAA athlete, all while a normal college student’s lifestyle is happening all around you. When everyone else goes out, he probably stays in.

But he makes those sacrifices and keeps on kicking.

Photo Copyright Justin Goldman – The Goalie Guild

To see this daily preparation, and to catch a good glimpse of his focus is a great scouting experience for myself. But I’ve seen this sort of thing for many years at another NCAA Division-I school — the University of Denver.

Because of my four years of experience covering their games and coaching goalies for their prestigious youth hockey program, I know how special NCAA goalies can be. From Adam Berkhoel to Mark Cheverie, commitment was simply not an option.

Therefore, it was easy to be impressed with Landon’s performance in this week’s camp. He processed the lessons and the drills with a quiet, surgeon-like intelligence. He understood everything, he made the adjustments when asked to, and he improved every day.

And he did all of this with a really calm demeanor. He just had that look about him; an unfazed, unassuming, “go with the flow” kind of attitude.

On top of everything I witnessed in terms of his discipline and his balance of school, team practices and the Mentorship Camp, it’s hard to believe that none of those were even considered his finest traits on display.

That trait, you ask?

It’s his glove hand — it’s straight up sick.

It’s not necessarily the speed that wows me, either. It’s simply the control and the consistency. He catches pucks cleanly, and with an extremely high efficiency rate. He also displays awesome hand biomechanics; he can twist, rotate and adjust his wrist and hand in ways that allow him to catch pucks that would otherwise hit the cuff or the palm, leading to bad rebounds.

I noticed this on numerous occasions with pucks that were directly over his left shoulder blade. Most guys can’t tuck their wrist in, but he did it so fast and so smoothly so often that it only took a few on-ice sessions to realize his glove hand was special.

Simply put, Landon has the natural flexibility and athleticism to catch pucks that most goalies at his level simply can’t. I would have to say that he already has an NHL-caliber glove hand, and the main reason for that is due to his sheer natural abilities.

Mike Valley often says that if you control the ice, you control the game. But I think you can extend that phrase to other parts of the position as well, and the glove hand is definitely one of them.

Just look at goalies like Pekka Rinne, Miikka Kiprusoff and Kari Lehtonen. Not only are all three Finnish superstars, but they all excel with catching pucks. They’ll catch pucks above, below, in front of, and across their body in order to control the game.

This is a skill you simply can’t overlook. Coaches love it; you get that whistle late in a game, you get to make that line change, the boys get a breather. It just helps your team out in so many ways, and as a result, it’s an instant confidence-booster.

Photo Copyright Justin Goldman – The Goalie Guild

But Landon is no one-trick pony, and there’s much more to like about his game.

He’s really athletic for his size, and can scramble well. He makes the first save with great positioning, and as the week went on, he improved his balance and positioning on second and third saves. He has an active stick to go with his active glove, so many rebounds he did give up were swatted away in a hurry.

Like everyone else in the camp, he had terrific skating skills, good durability, and plenty of core/leg strength. He managed pucks well, sealed the ice well, and displayed a real well-rounded game.

Although Valley did make a few tweaks throughout the week, from my perspective, I noticed that Landon was rarely ever hesitant, tense or janky. He had very good timing, he displayed a relaxed upper body, and it was easy to see his on-ice intelligence. He processed information quickly, and that allowed him to stay in control, but also loose and relaxed in net.

After pondering everything I witnessed from Landon this week, I came to the conclusion that there’s an aquatic element to his game. He is a calm and smooth goaltender, and like water, his body (especially his hands) can adapt and adjust to the slightest angle changes and deflections.

He fills space seamlessly, and he rarely locks up his arms or shoulders. There is control when he’s scrambling; he doesn’t change states from composed to urgent to desperate when heat or pressure is applied, yet he still battles to cover rebounds, and still fights for sight lines.

That may be the main reason why I consider him as a goalie that moves really well and rarely gets caught in the blocking mode. He was simply born to be a reflex-first, natural-reaction type of goaltender.

That aquatic element combined with his trait of discipline will go a long way as his game continues to mature. Both worlds (mental and technical) work together harmoniously, and his confidence is rising.

I have never seen Landon play a full game before, I’ve only evaluated his progress during this camp. But I can still safely say that I won’t be surprised when he runs away with the starting gig for the Badgers next season.

Photo Copyright Justin Goldman – The Goalie Guild

JG: Explain your experience this week and what it has been like working with Mike at such a high level.

LP: “It’s phenomenal working with Valley. He knows everything; just little changes he makes to my game helps me make huge improvements. He’s been around the league and the game so much that he knows little tweaks can make big differences in big situations. So he’s taking little pieces of my game and then he can really expand on them and make me a more complete and better goalie.”

JG: Talk about your freshman year at Wisconsin as a walk-on goaltender.

LP: “Coming in, after being accepted back in March, they said that there would be three goalies, but none of us had played a single college game before, so they said the starting job was open for the taking. Throughout September while we were practicing, during the first week of the year, they said I would be playing the first game of the season. I think I was the first freshman to start the first game of the season since Curtis Joseph. So that was pretty cool and a great experience to have, especially at home when there are thousands of loud fans on top of you. Off the ice, you have to do your training and everything like that to make sure you stay in shape and can battle through a 60-minute game no problem. So it was just being in shape, and trying to focus on having a complete game.”

JG: What is your mindset moving forward through the rest of the summer and for next season?

LP: “Just make sure I work hard this summer, and stay well-conditioned. Also mental strength is huge for me, and it’s something we work on a lot here at Wisconsin. Just making sure I can be lights out from start to finish. I know I have the confidence in me, and it’s just a matter of maintaining that confidence so I know I can save all of the pucks I face. I just want to be confident in my movements and my technique and everything, and just have complete games and be lights out. If I can do that, everything will just take care of itself.”

JG: Has your glove always been your best asset?

LP: “Yeah, it has been [laughing]. Growing up, even when I was like three or four, I was already catching baseballs from my dad and my brother. I was a catcher, so everything comes really natural for me. My hand-eye coordination feels really good, so it has always come natural to me, and it is something I’ve been blessed with.”

JG: Do you throw balls against the wall and hone it?

LP: “Well, most of it has just been natural, but I started to really juggle more consistently last summer. I’ve also been doing more stuff against the wall like Ells [Brian Elliott] and starting to get the hang of it. More is always better when it comes to honing my hand-eye coordination, so you can never be satisfied with even your best skills.”

JG: I’ve been asking everyone about the two Martial Arts classes this week. How cool was it to spend some time with a Martial Arts Master for a few hours?

LP: “I’ve been working with Valls for a long time here, and he’s taught so much on the physical and technical aspect of being a goalie, but he also teaches a lot on the mental strength. too. As a goalie, it’s really huge because you have to be focused and mentally strong, and calm inside your brain. Your brain controls all of your body movements, and it’s huge because you want your mind and body to be in contact, so you act as one and not two pieces. So it’s huge working with Josh Trowbridge because he’s a master at it; he can teach you simple breathing techniques to help you relieve all your stress and help you live in the moment. You can’t be distracted with stuff after practice or what happened last week, so Josh was really helpful in showing us that everything is just right there in front of you. He helps you just live and play in the moment.”

JG: It takes a special athlete to be an NCAA goalie. Talk a little bit about that aspect of your life.

LP: “Well, first thing’s first, you have to say school comes first because you never know if hockey is going to work out for you. So I take care of myself really well in school by studying and doing my homework right after practice. Next is hockey; hockey is a really big commitment here. You have to come in every day prepared, and you have to work and stay focused because you do play like you practice. You have to come in day after day and have a focused mindset. You really have to leave your ego at the door, and we have that same saying here at Wisconsin. From there, I just focus on hockey when I’m in the rink, and nothing else. Then it’s all about time management and making sure you get everything done at the right time.”