Brandt Clarke's Goal: Discipline in the Underhandle
Brandt Clarke scored an effortless style goal last night against the San Jose Sharks, combing D activation on a slant route combined with a mohawk pivot, and the most important thing, discipline in how he used underhandling to handle the puck in the sequence. The discipline in the underhandle is one of the hardest skills for a hockey player to do, because players have a natural instinct to want and stickhandle when they get the puck.
Underhandling is also difficult because when under pressure, players also have a natural inclination to want to stickhandle to maneuver away from that pressure. What Clarke did last night was a masterpiece in how he combined the underhandle and how he leveraged outside edgework to propel himself into space to create a shot lane. This looked easy when watching it on film, but it’s much tougher to actually execute since it takes that extra bit of mental discipline.
As the late man into the zone in this off-rush sequence, Clarke does a great job of reading Adrian Kempe’s slant route with the puck when trying to maneuver laterally inside the offensive zone. Kempe’s slant route initially off the puck allows him to create space individually, and then be available for a pass back on entry. Kempe receives the pass, and then Clarke activates into the space counter to Kempe, where he is wide open and activates with speed into that space. Because San Jose wasn’t intent on D activation from LA in this scenario, the high Fs from San Jose are focused on the lateral movement from Kempe with the puck off the pass back on entry, opening up Clarke for multiple reasons:
This creates a ton of room in interior for Clarke to maneuver through. Clarke retrieves the puck off the pass, and does a great job using a 10-2 mohawk pivot and leveraging the push off from his outside edges to maintain cruising speed when retrieving the puck. Clarke’s outside edge acceleration also keeps his body angled to the net, allowing him to shoot directly off the catch if he wanted to. Instead, Clarke waits and holds, changing the goalie’s shot angle and forcing the goalie to move laterally. Clarke uses one puck touch, holds the puck on his stick blade, and does a great job shooting to the far side of the goalie in this scenario.
Clarke has been heavily involved in transition and offensive playmaking for the Kings thus far this season, where Clarke has been one of the league’s more underrated defenders to start the first quarter of the NHL season. He’s really delivered on his offensive potential that he was projected to have when he was drafted by LA in 2021, where his offensive potential in the OHL eventually translated effortlessly to the AHL and now the NHL.
On the shot, Clarke also does a great job planting his inside edge on his strong foot (right side) to leverage center of gravity and shooting from his hip pocket with a balanced stance. Clarke keeps that edge grounded into the ice, and keeps his front toe pointed toward the net in alignment with his lower body, allowing him to rotate his upper body freely and shoot towards the far side of the net in this sequence. Clarke is going to be a defenseman to watch in the future on the blue line for the Kings, where the Kings have seemed to get slightly younger on their blue line in a positive way, where they have many young defenders who fit their style of play really well now.