Carefull preparation makes Belfour a Star
By Sharon Raboin, USA TODAY 4/99
DALLAS - So fussy about his skates, Dallas Stars goaltender Ed Belfour once spent a solid six hours hunched over the sharpener on one pair.
He guided the blades back and forth, chipping slivers of metal until the edges met with his approval.
It's not just his skates. His leg pads must fit snuggly against his shins, yet not be too restrictive because he likes to skate outside the crease and handle the puck. He's willing to invest hours in tweaking all his pads if that's what it takes to feel comfortable and confident.
This dogged attention to detail has brought Belfour from obscurity - he couldn't make his high school team until he was a senior - to stardom.
"I'm definitely one of the best," he says with pride. "Always have been; always will be. I won't accept anything less."
Nothing is left to chance. At least two hours a day, the 34-year-old painstakingly stretches his 5-11, 182-pound frame, working out the kinks so he can contort his arms and legs in a split second to block 3-inch-wide, rubber pucks zooming at him at 90 mph.
"He drives the trainers nuts because he's here for about 19 hours a day," Stars forward Brian Skrudland says.
A personal masseur and chef are regulars at his five-bedroom, surburban Dallas home. Before games, Belfour eats salmon or steak, with pasta and broccoli, which must be served between 1-2 p.m.
Sure, Belfour is quirky. But quirky with a purpose.
"Some guys are out playing golf, and I'd like to be doing it, too," Belfour says. "But my life and my priorities are trying to be the best I can be."
He can even get cross if his focus and routines are disrupted. Stars coach Ken Hitchcock says some days "he looks like a cross between Jeremiah Johnson and Grizzly Adams."
That's because now in his 11th season, Belfour has devised an intricate system to make sure he is ready to play.
Always fine-tuning
The meticulous preparation has produced Calder (NHL rookie of the year), Vezina (NHL most valuable goalie) and Jennings (goalie for the team with the fewest goals scored against it) trophies and NHL all-star selections in seven of the last nine years.
In his two seasons with the Stars, Belfour has led the franchise to back-to-back President's Trophies, awarded to the team with the most regular-season wins.
This season he's second in the NHL with a 35-15-9 record and third with a 1.99 goals-against average.
All goalies have quirks, but Stars defenseman Craig Ludwig says Belfour "probably leads the pack."
Stars equipment manager Dave Smith says most goalies are concerned about how their equipment feels. But Smith says Belfour is "adventurous."
"He wants to experiment with new ways to do an old job," Smith says. "It would be like an Indy-car driver, fine-tuning to be a step better than the next guy."
Players joke that Belfour is the only player in the NHL with an hourly contract. To get a snarl out of him, they kick his leg pads, carefully placed upright in the dressing room.
"Sometimes they razz me," Belfour says. "But I know it's all in fun. The coaching staff and the guys are patient, and they accept it. I appreciate it."
But there was an adjustment period in the beginning.
"There were times we moved practice back because Eddie wasn't ready," Ludwig says. "Now, the way he has played, Ed can do whatever he wants. If he wants to put incense (in his locker) and start burning it, I don't care."
Hitchcock is flexible with Belfour, even moving practice back a half-hour to 10:30 a.m. to grant his wish.
"He's our key performer," Hitchcock says. "He has to stop the puck for us to win. If it doesn't matter to half our team and the other half doesn't care, what's the difference?"
Hitchcock also permits Belfour to skip the pregame skate if he notifies him ahead of time.
Not everything is negotiable, though. Hitchcock is a stickler about timeliness. If Belfour comes to practice late, he gets punished like his teammates.
"He tests the bus," Hitchcock says. "But he's on time. He knows the two times he wasn't, the bus left. One time he was in a car in the parking lot."
But, Hitchcock says, "I really like him.
"Yeah, he's different. Yeah, he has some things that test me as a coach. But all good players do that."
Mother knows best
Even in high school, Belfour was conscientious about his equipment.
"He would air out his pads in the living room," says his mother, Alma.
She tried to get him to stash the smelly gear downstairs, but he argued it was too damp.
"I'd leave them because if I moved them I knew he'd get very upset," she says.
But the fastidiousness only went so far. "His room was a disaster area," she says.
When it came to hockey, Belfour learned that he needed to pay attention to detail and develop a fierce competitiveness to give himself a chance to fulfill his dream of playing in the NHL.
"Some guys we grew up with, people would say, 'This guy will make the NHL for sure,' " says Buddy Voth, Belfour's manager and childhood friend. "No one ever said it about Ed."
Belfour finally made his high school team in Carman, a town of about 2,500 in Manitoba, when he was a senior.
"It really hurt him," Alma says. "He came home one night and said he had a stomachache. I knew it wasn't a stomachache. He said, 'That's my team. Why can't I be the goaltender?' I said, 'Keep your faith in God and your eye on what you want to be.' "
The rejection continued. There were no college scholarship offers; no NHL teams drafted him.
But his resolve never wavered. He worked day shifts, cleaning air filters and rebuilding radiators, while playing junior hockey.
Belfour was a walk-on at the University of North Dakota, where he led the team to the NCAA championship in his only season.
Then he signed a free-agent contract with the Chicago Blackhawks in 1987, where his career took off.
"Sometimes I can't quite believe it," his proud mother says. "I'm sitting at home watching TV or I'll pick up a magazine and there's his picture. 'Wow, that's my son.' "
She adds, "You wonder how lucky you were to have a son like him."
Although Belfour now has fame and fortune, Hitchcock thinks his early struggles still affect him.
"You think the worst all the time," Hitchcock says. "You think you're always going to go to the altar and get rejected."
Pressure is on again
Now's the time Belfour must produce. His quirks could quickly turn from endearing to exasperating if the Stars don't get past nemesis and two-time defending Stanley Cup champion Detroit for a berth in the final.
"There's not a guy in here who doesn't believe Eddie is the guy to do the job," Skrudland says.
The Stanley Cup is the one achievement that has eluded Belfour. He led the Blackhawks to the championship in 1991-92, his second full season, where they lost in four games to the Pittsburgh Penguins.
"I wouldn't want to retire and not have won," he says.
Some believe Belfour imploded under playoff pressure last season, punching San Jose Sharks forward Shawn Burr in the first round and slashing Red Wings forward Martin Lapointe in the conference final.
"Meltdown?" Hitchcock says. "No. Did he lose that competitive edge and put it on the other side a couple of times? Yeah. But everybody does."
Belfour says he was "real bad" when he was younger.
"I'd lose my temper, get out of control, fight or break sticks, coffee pots, fans," he says. "I try to control it better. I'm still as competitive, though."
To skeptics who find him gifted but too feisty or peculiar to win when it matters most, Belfour says, "Anybody who tells me I can't do something, all it does is motivate me."
Posted: Monday January 15, 2001 12:15 PM
Updated: Monday January 15, 2001 5:31 PM
After his much-publicized walkout, Ed Belfour is back in the fold with the Dallas Stars. While the self-inflicted controversy swirled, rookie Marty Turco was brilliant in three successive victories -- responding in just the manner head coach Ken Hitchcock and general manager Bob Gainey had hoped. Not that they doubted Turco. He is the winningest goaltender in NCAA history, posting 127 victories for the University of Michigan. He served his two-year apprenticeship in the minors with the Stars' IHL affiliate in Kalamazoo, Mich. Turco's resolve was certainly timely, but the results also served as validation that he is indeed the right guy to eventually take on the top job in goal for Dallas.
Actually, the Stars succession planning goes back a few seasons. They had Roman Turek, Manny Fernandez and Turco all in the organization behind Belfour. The dilemma? Deciding the best fit long term and devising a strategy to handle the expansion drafts of 1999 and 2000. The Stars knew that Turek just needed playing time to prove his skills at the NHL level. They also knew they couldn't keep him and Fernandez, so the St. Louis Blues acquired Turek -- part of some draft-day maneuvering. The Stars believed that Fernandez was the best athlete of the three. Yet, they felt that his mental approach lagged behind his athleticism. Last summer, the Minnesota Wild selected him and he has flourished in an environment where winning is not the full focus yet -- leaving Turco as Belfour's backup partner this season. Finally, in evaluating the three goaltenders, the Stars believed that Turco had the best chance to be an every-day impact player at the NHL level. And that was long before his star-turn in the glare of the spotlight, when his team needed him most.
Before Turco and before moving on, both Turek and Fernandez served as Belfour's backup. And this notion of planning for the eventuality of the "old guard" leaving the game is going on all around the league. Goaltending dominated the NHL in the 1990's, led by Belfour, Patrick Roy, Dominik Hasek and Martin Brodeur. This season, rookies Evgeni Nabokov, Brent Johnson, Mathieu Garon and Turco all have shown that strong goaltending will continue to be hallmark in the NHL. These youngsters have a few things in common: They all served at least two full seasons in the minors and they all have made the most of their playing time. A few subtle differences in Garon's case -- he is the only one of the four who has spent time in the minors this season. He is also the only one who plays for a losing team and hails from the Eastern Conference -- the other three play for Western Conference powers with Stanley Cup aspirations.
The story does not end there, however. If you dig a little, trying to find where the old and the new meet when it comes to men of the crease, who do you find standing at the crossroads? Well, if Blues music has Robert Johnson, today's NHL goaltending has Eddie Belfour. We have already covered his role in affecting the careers of Turek, Fernandez and Turco. That influence extends to Johnson, Turek's partner in St. Louis. Johnson told me that the veteran Turek has helped him immensely and that he is the best goaltending partner he has ever had. Without Belfour, maybe Turek isn't in St. Louis and Johnson's destiny is different.
Destiny? You want destiny? What about the fate of Hasek? He went to Buffalo in August of 1992. Why? Because the Blackhawks didn't have any room in goal -- a guy named Belfour was too busy leading Chicago to the Stanley Cup finals. So, Hasek goes on to stardom for the Sabres and says he will retire after the season, opening the starter role for 23-year-old Martin Biron. And the Belfour-Hasek-Biron connection extends all the way to San Jose where Steve Shields entered the season as the Sharks' top netminder. Shields served as Hasek's backup in Buffalo for parts of three seasons from 1995-98. The Sabres dealt him to the Sharks because they had Biron, whom they selected in the first round of the 1995 entry draft, developing. Shields goes down with an injury in the second week of the season and little-known Evgeni Nabokov never looks back, taking full advantage of the playing time. His 23 wins tie him with Roy atop the league and I bet he doesn't even know about the powerful, pass-through link to Belfour.
Speaking of Roy, he certainly would never admit to Belfour's hidden stamp on his accomplishments. However, without a foil, accolades lack a certain appeal. Roy and Belfour have been bitter rivals throughout their careers, routinely exchanging barbs in the press. Belfour openly challenges Roy's supposed supremacy, using that notion as motivation. How much of Roy's achievement as the winningest goaltender of all time can be accorded the personal rivalry with Belfour? We may never know the full extent.
How about north of the border, where Mathieu Garon is getting his chance to play in Montreal due to an injury to top netminder Jeff Hackett. Well, Hackett and Belfour were partners in Chicago for four seasons. Their relationship? Contentious at best, with the cantankerous and competitive Belfour telling Hackett that he would never be more than "just an average goalie" in this league. In a twist of fate, the Blackhawks shipped Belfour to the Sharks midway through the 1996-97 season -- the team from which Chicago had acquired Hackett in 1993. Belfour was less than average himself in San Jose -- going 3-9, with a 3.41 GA -- before signing as a free agent with the Stars in the summer of '97. If Garon only knew.
Finally, you ask, how does Belfour relate to Brodeur, the youngest of the old guard and the man that bested him in last spring's Stanley Cup final. Aside from that obvious confrontational connection, Belfour's mystical degree of separation runs through Minnesota to get to Brodeur. Remember that Belfour's partner in Dallas last season was Manny Fernandez, the top guy for the Wild this season. Jacques Lemaire coaches Fernandez and the Wild. Lemaire coached Brodeur and the Devils for five seasons. Coincidence, or another example of standing at the crossroads with Eddie -- that point where the past, present and future converge?
Belfour among best of his time
10/04/2000
By Chuck Carlton / The Dallas Morning News
The chant began as a simple observation and turned into a Reunion Arena anthem.
"Eddie's better! Eddie's better!" came the refrain from the sellout crowd after Stars goaltender Ed Belfour had once again bested Colorado Avalanche counterpart Patrick Roy in a decisive Game 7 last spring. After the Western Conference banner is raised Wednesday in the regular-season opener and the puck is dropped, the same chorus will probably be heard once more, ringing in the new season like "Auld Lang Syne" does the new year.
Roy is four victories away from topping Terry Sawchuk's record of 447 wins, once considered as unbreakable as Cy Young's 511 pitching victories. When the climatic moment comes, Roy will likely receive acclaim as the greatest goalie of all time.
Yet Belfour's play the past three years � against Roy, Martin Brodeur and Dominik Hasek � gives him a claim to being the best goalie of his time.
"I think he deserves a lot of respect with all he's done the last couple of seasons," Stars center Mike Modano said. "There were a lot of goalies who were supposed to beat him, and they didn't get it done."
Glowing reviews from teammates are predictable. Belfour's criteria transcend sound bites.
Since escaping from San Jose to Dallas in 1997 as a free agent, Belfour has more regular-season wins (104) than any goalie except Brodeur and the most playoff victories (40) and rounds won (nine).
The past two seasons, he has faced Roy in the Western finals. Each time, the Stars have advanced to the Stanley Cup Finals. Roy's reputation was built on being a gunslinger who won the biggest games.
"Part of the mystique that changed Eddie as a goaltender is beating the very best," said ESPN analyst Darren Pang, a former Belfour goaltending rival with the Chicago Blackhawks. "Nothing is better to define where you are than beating Patrick in a seven-game series � twice."
Not everybody agrees with the assessment. Roy maintains the duel was a draw, at best.
"[The media] has to write something, and people say, 'Oh, Belfour outplayed Roy.' I don't think I was outplayed and all that," Roy told the Denver Post recently. "I have to recognize that he played extremely well, like I did. Fortunate for him, he was on the winning side, and I was on the losing side. When you lose, people look for excuses, but I'm not here for excuses."
Belfour refuses to be drawn into a debate, especially when so much can be decided on the ice. He talks about the privilege of playing for a winning team and recognition flowing from team success.
"Any time you're playing against the elite guys, you want to go out and be the best you can be," said Belfour, almost fully recovered from a sore heel that limited him during the preseason. "I'd like to think of myself as being among the elite guys."
While Belfour is a need-for-speed guy who collects muscle cars and once competed at an Ohio drag strip, his evolution as a goaltender took more than a decade. Pang remembers him as a stubborn rookie who would claim Pang's net as his own in practice.
"I need some shots," Belfour would tell him.
"Then go down to the other end," Pang responded.
In Chicago, Belfour worked with goaltending coach Vladislav Tretiak, a Russian hockey legend, and laid the foundation for a career that would include two Vezina Trophies as the league's top goaltender, 308 career victories and more upgrades than Windows.
"I think he's playing better now than when he won the Vezina twice," Pang said. "I think he's where he and Tretiak envisioned he'd be eventually.
"It's like breaking down a golf swing. It takes time. It's a slow transition. He plays now like [Tretiak] played. The holes are taken away, the legs are tighter and he has the economy of movement."
Belfour views the goal area not as an office but as a garage, a workshop to perfect the product. He once spent $50,000 to get the right goaltending equipment and even designed his own skates so the blades could be changed quicker.
"I like it a certain way, and that's the way I've got to have it to play the way I do," Belfour said. "There's an association there because when you're working on an engine or a car, there has to be a lot of detail or focus put into building a car or an engine. I don't get a chance to get to work on that part all the time. When I do, I definitely put focus into it and want it done right. If I'm driving the car down a race track at 150 miles per hour, I want to make sure it stays together."
Added buddy Jeff Friesen, who helps Belfour at Carman Racing in Freeland, Mich.: "Everything he does is about attention to detail. He wants to do everything to the best of his ability."
Belfour maintained his focus and held together last season after an arrest a little more than a month before the postseason. His day in court on a misdemeanor charge of resisting transfer, which can draw a sentence of up to a year in jail, is no closer than it was last spring. Court settings for the prosecutor and defense attorney to meet have been postponed several times. A meeting scheduled for last Monday was reset for Nov. 8 in County Criminal Court 6.
Belfour was arrested March 8 after he allegedly assaulted a security guard at The Mansion on Turtle Creek and resisted Dallas police. He was arrested on misdemeanor assault and resisting arrest charges, but Dallas County court dockets show the Stars goalie faces a single Class A misdemeanor charge of resisting transfer. Belfour declined to talk about the incident and is guarded about his personal life.
At a luncheon for season-ticket holders, Stars broadcast analyst Daryl Reaugh introduced Belfour and asked, "Have any problems with security, Eddie?" Belfour responded by putting Reaugh into a mock headlock to laughter. In six months, "America's Most Wanted" had morphed into "Saturday Night Live."
"That was all Daryl; he did that," Belfour said, smiling and walking away.
Even teammates admit Belfour is a puzzle. Some days he doesn't practice, in part to rest a sore back. He goes through his own conditioning regimen. The bottom line remains the same.
"All I know is when it comes time to drop the puck," veteran Kirk Muller said, "Eddie is going to be Eddie."
(Jan 18) DALLAS (CP) - Ed Belfour of the Dallas Stars has been named goaltender of the year for 2000 by Goalies' World magazine.
Using a complicated points system based on Hot, OK or Cold games, Goalies' World traced the league's goaltenders through three different periods: the second half of the 1999-2000 NHL season, the 2000 playoffs and the first half of this season. Olaf Kolzig of the Washington Capitals won the Vezina Trophy last season while Martin Brodeur of the New Jersey Devils and Curtis Joseph of the Toronto Maple Leafs are considered the front-runners to tend goal for Canada at the Salt Lake City Olympics next February, but it's Belfour that rated No. 1 in the magazine.
"It's really not that surprising," Goalies' World publisher Gilles Moffet said Thursday. "In the last two years, he's been unbelievable. He won a Cup in 1998 and was great last year in the playoffs, too."
"Consistency is the key and Belfour is the most consistent goaltender."
Moffet, whose Quebec City-based magazine is published six times a year, met with Belfour after Wednesday night's 3-2 overtime win by the Stars over Nashville to inform the goaltender of the honour.
"He's a proud guy. This matters to him," Moffet said.
Belfour came out on top from a final list of six goaltenders that included Joseph, Brodeur, Kolzig as well as Patrick Roy of the Colorado Avalanche and the resurgent Sean Burke from the Phoenix Coyotes.
"There's a lot of great goalies in the league. There isn't a great difference between the top five, six guys," Moffet said.
"But if you look at the number of bad games, Belfour barely had any (during that span)."
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Stars' Belfour gets probation for scuffle
Goalie apologizes to officers and fans, pays $3,000 fine in resisting-arrest case
11/01/2000
By Holly Becka / The Dallas Morning News
Dallas Stars goalie Ed Belfour was placed on 24 months' unsupervised probation Tuesday after he pleaded guilty and somberly apologized for his misdemeanor resisting-arrest case.
"I just want to express my sincere apologies," Mr. Belfour said, standing near the judge's bench and addressing the four Dallas police officers involved in his March arrest.
"I'm real sorry for the incident that took place. I won't let it happen again."
Mr. Belfour, 35, pleaded guilty to a Class A misdemeanor charge of resisting police transfer and was sentenced as part of a plea agreement. He paid his $3,000 fine and $225 in court costs Tuesday.
During his probation, Mr. Belfour must visit two area high schools to warn students about alcohol use. If he were to violate his probation, Mr. Belfour would face 175 days in jail.
The charge carries a maximum sentence of one year in jail and a $4,000 fine.
Mr. Belfour, a four-time All-Star, helped the Stars win the 1999 Stanley Cup and reach the Finals last season, where they lost to New Jersey in six games. He leads all active goaltenders with 50 shutouts, and is sixth in career wins (313).
Coach Ken Hitchcock praised the handling of the case after Tuesday's practice.
"I was very impressed with what Eddie said, and I was very impressed that the officers took time out of their day to come and sit in the courtroom with Eddie," he said. "He knows what he has to do, what his obligations are, and now we can move on."
According to a police report, an intoxicated Mr. Belfour arrived at The Mansion on Turtle Creek in Oak Lawn after midnight March 8 and was loud and abusive.
Officers said he scuffled with a security guard and then resisted police arrest until they used pepper spray on him.
Mr. Belfour again resisted arrest while he was detained in a squad car, police said. He spit in one officer's face and kicked two officers in the chest as they attempted to put plastic "flex cuffs" on his legs, according to a police report. The goalkeeper later begged not to go to jail, offering the officers up to $1 billion, police said.
Mr. Belfour's Class C misdemeanor assault charge, stemming from the incident with the hotel security guard, is still pending in a Dallas municipal court, although his defense attorney said he expected it to be dismissed.
Before Mr. Belfour issued his apology, County Criminal Court Judge Phil Barker admonished the goalie about his behavior: "You're an important part of the community," the judge said. "I think you owe an apology to some people."
Mr. Belfour nodded and then turned to address Dallas police Officer Will Smith, Officer Michael Horton, Senior Cpl. Martin Alig and Sgt. Jeff Tooker.
"I'm just real, real sorry," Mr. Belfour said.
The four officers declined to comment afterward. The goalie left the courtroom through a back exit and could not be reached for comment.
Jim Burnham, Mr. Belfour's attorney, said Mr. Belfour had asked to apologize so the officers and Dallas residents would know how bad he felt about the incident.
"It was his idea," Mr. Burnham said. "He apologized to everyone � the police, the fans and the Stars organization. It was the appropriate thing to do."
The attorney said that Mr. Belfour, a Canadian citizen, would not face deportation because of the case.
Tuesday's brief hearing wasn't on the court's docket, but Mr. Burnham said it was not unusual for a defendant to go to court to enter an early plea.
The next setting on the case would have been Nov. 8, when either a trial or a plea hearing was to be scheduled. Mr. Burnham said Mr. Belfour wanted to come in earlier than that to finalize the case because the goalie was facing a busy game and travel schedule.
Mr. Hitchcock said that the team had come to grips with the incident after an emotional speech by Mr. Belfour last season but that the sting lingered for his goaltender.
"When you're embraced by the community and you do something wrong, it's tough on you as a player; it's a headache that won't go away," the coach said. "Eddie had to deal with it, and I think he dealt with it properly and in as classy a manner as he could."
