With gnarly beards, missing teeth and deep scars, hockey players often look menacing and intimidating.
However, goalie Matt Jurusik showed up in Madison last fall with braces on his teeth.
As if he was not already set up for jokes aimed at his youth, the freshman with self-described big cheeks had to endure a couple weeks of chirping about his braces, which senior Kevin Schulze described as endless.
Nonetheless, Jurusik has been solid as the netminder for Wisconsin this year, posting a .892 save percentage. But he has had his share of ups and down, allowing eight goals against Minnesota, a game in which he was pulled for a brief time. However, he has also posted a shutout and has allowed just one goal in three games.
“It’s not been all roses that’s for sure. That’s been a big part of his growth are the ups and downs of being a freshman goalie and thrust into a position of being the goaltender of a Division 1 team,” head coach Mike Eaves said. “There’s been many games where he’s been outstanding and there’s been games where he would like to have some of those goals back.”
The high points came after a shutout of Michigan State followed up by a 54-save night against Penn State two weeks later, a game in which the Badgers took an overtime loss.
“It helped my confidence for sure knowing I could go through a tough grueling game like that, but yeah, it was tough to lose in overtime,” Jurusik said of the Penn State game.
Just one week after came the lowest of the lows, as he struggled through the contest against archrival Minnesota.
However, Jurusik handled the rough game like a seasoned veteran, turning it around the following weekend and allowing five goals over two games, both of them victories over Alaska.
“I didn’t get too down about it, you just need to learn how to put those games out of your head and move on, so it was a really good lesson,” Jurusik said. “Mental toughness you know, turning the page and forgetting about it and trying to prepare for the weekend we had; last weekend [against Alaska] which was really nice.”
Eaves and freshman forward Luke Kunin were quick to praise Jurusik for his resilience, saying it’s been the biggest part of his development as a young goaltender.
“You don’t go through all easy times, they’re not all bowls of cherries,” Eaves said. “The nice thing about Matty is to see how he responded after that Saturday night game against Minnesota where he had a good week of practice and he came back and got a couple wins for us.”
“Everyone’s gonna have rough games here or there but the way you bounce back from it is I think is the biggest part,” Kunin said. “That Minnesota weekend he wishes he was better, he had a good bounceback weekend, and played great for us.”
In the highest pressure position in the sport, Jurusik was certainly given a tall task as the man between the pipes for a storied program like Wisconsin. It wouldn’t be accurate to say he has blown expectations out of the water, because, as Eaves said, there’s been plenty of games where he hasn’t performed brilliantly.
But, possibly more important than his stat line is his mental growth as a hockey player, an area he has shown maturity in. Allowing eight goals in front of the biggest Kohl Center crowd this year could have caused a young goalie to fold over, but Jurusik picked his head up and got his team back in the win column less than a week later, an attitude that will serve him well as he continues his career.
“The sky’s the limit. I don’t think it’s fair to put limitations on him,” said Eaves. “I think in his athleticism he reminds me of Joel Rumpel and he’s got a good work ethic much like a Landon Peterson, so with that combination, with the work he’s doing with Jeff Sanger, our goalie coach, I think we will find out together what his top end is.”
That’s some pretty high praise for a guy who is only 18 years old. Rumpel, who posted a .902 save percentage for the Badgers last year, is currently in the San Jose Sharks organization. But Eaves is not the only one with high expectations for Jurusik. He’s set some lofty goals for himself as well.
“I really want to be a dominant goaltender, no matter what age I am, no matter what class I am, I want to be one of the best goaltenders in the league and I’m working toward that right now, so hopefully I get there soon,” Jurusik said.
The baby-faced goalie with braces has grown up quite a bit in just a few short months.
