Roberto Luongo

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Position Goaltender
Catches Left
Height
Weight		 6 ft 3 in (1.91 m)
205 lb (93 kg)
NHL Team
F. Teams		 Vancouver Canucks
Florida Panthers
New York Islanders
Nationality Flag of Canada Canada
Born April 4, 1979,
Montreal, PQ, CAN
NHL Draft 4th overall, 1997
New York Islanders
Pro Career 1999 – present

Roberto Luongo (born April 4, 1979, in Montreal, Quebec) is a professional ice hockey goaltender with the Vancouver Canucks. He is considered to be one of the NHL's best goaltenders from the modern age.

Contents

[edit] Playing career

Luongo began his record-breaking junior hockey career at the age of 16. He joined the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League's Val-d'Or Foreurs for the 1995-96 QMJHL season, and the next year, he notched 32 wins, a club record. He didn't stop there. The year after that spectacular season, Luongo backstopped the Foreurs to the Memorial Cup finals and established a league regular-season single-season record with 7 shutouts. After he was traded to the Acadie-Bathurst Titan midway through 1998-99, he again pursued the Memorial Cup, but midway through that season the NHL came calling.

Luongo was drafted in the first round, 4th overall in the 1997 NHL Entry Draft by the New York Islanders. At the time no goaltender had ever been drafted that high. Although the Isles returned 18-year-old Luongo to the QMJHL, they'd had every intention of getting him dressed for a 1998-99 NHL game. Contractual problems changed the plan.

Although Luongo finally signed a contract, he was "bitterly dismayed" upon his arrival with the American Hockey League's Lowell Lock Monsters — New York had demoted him. "When I got here I said to myself, "Just work hard and get some experience. Just try to get better every day, Luongo." He did not make his NHL debut until November 28, 1999, when he stopped 43 pucks during a 2-1 win against the Boston Bruins.

He had a 3.25 Goals-Against Average and .904 save percentage over 24 games as an Islander, on the NHL's third-worst team. Fans were shocked when Islanders General Manager Mike Milbury suddenly traded him to the Florida Panthers in 2000, where Luongo would spend five seasons.

Luongo played 47 games as a Panther in 2000-01 and posted a sparkling .920 save percentage. But he was pretty much all the talent the struggling Panthers had. Partly through another disappointing season in 2001, the Panthers hired new coach "Iron Mike" Keenan. Keenan is well known for frequently pulling his goaltenders for no obvious reason — once even making four goalie changes in one period.

"It isn't that big a deal," Luongo maintained later that season. "He does it so much that we expect it. When you're sitting on the bench and you're an NHL goaltender and Mike Keenan is your coach you have to be ready, just in case."[citation needed] In 2002-03, Luongo faced over 2,000 shots, yet saved 91.8% of them. He impressively placed second in voting for the Vezina Trophy in 2004 when he faced the most shots ever by any goaltender (2,475) in a season and still managed to maintain an impressive 2.43 GAA and a sun-striking .931 save percentage — first among goalies with 50-plus starts that year (Luongo had 72). He also set an NHL record for most saves in a season with 2,303, as well as picking up 7 shutouts, fifth in the league, but he lost out to fellow Montrealer Martin Brodeur that season. Still, Keenan found cause for criticism.

"He's played a lot of goal, he's had a good save percentage, he's had to stop a lot of shots," admitted Keenan of Luongo, "but Roberto has to learn how to really win as does the rest of the team."[citation needed]

Defenceman Eric Brewer, one of Luongo's former Islanders teammates who then played for the Edmonton Oilers, told the goalie that same year, "Honestly, Roberto, I don't even want to know how you can take all that rubber day in and day out. After such a high frequency of 40 shots a game you face, not only does it wear your gear, it starts to wear your mind."[citation needed] But both Brewer and Keenan suffered no reaction from an unflappable Luongo, who said:

“I can’t score goals, so I can’t worry about it and allow it to distract me. I just worry about what I have to do and don’t try to control anything else. All of this is in the hope of winning the Stanley Cup one day. That’s everybody’s goal in this dressing room. I don’t know how many of us will be here if or when that happens, but hopefully it will be a lot of us.”

[citation needed]

After a poor start to 2005-06 in Florida, there were rumours that he would be traded, which heightened after Keenan, now Panthers GM, offered Luongo a $30 million, five-year contract in January, which Luongo rejected. During this period, the star goalie coined the phrase "It's a Luongo thing." Because of his refusal to sign a long-term contract, much speculation rose that the Panthers could choose to trade him instead of letting him leave after the currently ongoing NHL season as a free agent for no compensation. On June 23, 2006, Luongo was traded along with defenseman Lukas Krajicek and a sixth-round draft pick in 2006 to Vancouver in exchange for forward Todd Bertuzzi, goaltender Alexander Auld, and defenseman Bryan Allen. Luongo later signed a 4-year, $27 million dollar deal with the Canucks, tying Nikolai Khabibulin as the highest paid goaltender in the National Hockey League. Upon arrival in Vancouver, he received the nickname Robogo.

Luongo is a regular in the lineup for the Canadian national team, usually playing a backup role to Martin Brodeur. He has played in four World Championships, winning two golds and a silver, was on the Canadian team which won the 2004 World Cup of Hockey, and was selected for the 2006 Winter Olympic Games.

His parents came from Santa Paolina, Avellino, Italy.

[edit] Movements

[edit] Career statistics

[edit] Regular season

   
Season Team League GP W L T MIN GA SO GAA
1995-96 Val d'Or QMJHL 23 6 11 4  ?  ? 0 3.70
1996-97 Val d'Or QMJHL 60 32 21 2 3305 171 2 3.10
1997-98 Val d'Or QMJHL 54 27 20 5 3046 157 7 3.09
1998-99 Acadie-Bathurst QMJHL 22 14 7 1 1342 74 0 3.31
1999-00 Lowell AHL 26 10 12 4 1517 74 1 2.93
1999-00 NY Islanders NHL 24 7 14 1 1292 70 1 3.25
2000-01 Louisville AHL 3 1 2 0 178 10 0 3.38
2000-01 Florida NHL 47 12 24 7 2628 107 5 2.44
2001-02 Florida NHL 58 16 33 4 3030 140 4 2.77
2002-03 Florida NHL 65 20 34 7 3627 164 6 2.71
2003-04 Florida NHL 72 25 33 14 4251 172 7 2.43
2005-06 Florida NHL 75 35 30 9 (OTL) 3061 153 4 2.97
2006-07 Vancouver NHL 29 14 13 1 1630 69 1 2.54
NHL CAREER TOTALS 370 129 181 43 20764 889 28 2.70

[edit] Playoffs

   
Season Team League GP W L T MIN GA SO GAA
1995-96 Val d'Or QMJHL 3 0 1 68 5 0 4.41
1996-97 Val d'Or QMJHL 13 8 5 777 44 0 3.39
1997-98 Val d'Or QMJHL 17 14 3 1019 37 2 2.17
1998-99 Acadie-Bathurst QMJHL 23 16 6 1 1400 64 0 2.74
1999-00 Lowell AHL 6 3 3 359 18 0 2.91
NHL CAREER TOTALS

[edit] International play

   
Year Team Event GP W L T SO GAA
1998 Canada U20 3 0 0 0 0 2.89
1999 Canada U20 7 4 2 1 0 1.93
2001 Canada WC 2 1 0 0 0 1.44
2003 Canada WC 4 3 0 1 1 1.98
2004 Canada WC 7 5 1 1 1 2.32
2004 Canada W-Cup 1 1 0 0 0 2.82
2005 Canada WC 2 1 0 1 1 1.50
2006 Canada OG 2 1 1 0 0 1.51
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