Charlie McAvoy had zero NHL experience and played 26 minutes a night when he debuted in the playoffs. Studnicka also would be taking Nordstrom's roster spot and lets be honest, that's not a huge loss.
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Besides, it is not like Coyle looked any better at RW. Coyle needs to play center, he makes the third line have great depth.
Its about making the 2nd line better and the overall team better. I'm not sold on a line of Ritchie/Krejci/Kase and while the sample size is small, they played nearly identical time together as DeBrusk/Krejci/Coyle. The advanced stats between the two are night and day:
CF%
NR/OK: 48.1%
JD/CC: 50.8%
SF%
NR/OK: 45.8%
JD/CC: 54.6%
xGF%
NR/OK: 42.8%
JD/CC: 62.8%
SCF%
NR/OK: 53.9%
JD/CC: 59.0%
HDCF%
NR/OK: 40.0%
JD/CC: 61.1%
I'm also of the thought that having Studnicka at your #3C doesn't hurt your depth, which lead to your next point....
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Also, not a chance you can convince me Studnicka is better defensively than Coyle. Coyle was killing penalties on the second unit and was looking like a monster on that unit.
Coyle was 7th among B's forwards in SH TOI and averaged 54 seconds of SH TOI per game. If he was "a monster" he'd be in the top 4 among forwards. As for Studnicka, I'm lucky enough to have 4 AHL teams within a few hours of me and two of them within 30 minutes of my house, so I get to see a lot of games. Studnicka right now is on par/if not better than Coyle defensively and is a threat offensively (led the AHL in SHG). I've seen the kid play quiet a bit this year in person, have you?
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All im saying is: we're all excited for Stunicka. But there is absolutely 0 need to rush him into this lineup. Call him up for practices, but he shouldn't play unless he absolutely has to. You play Studnicka next season and go from there.
You put your team in the best situation to win a cup now, like you said we're in win now mode. Studnicka is an upgrade over Nordstrom and DeBrusk/Coyle w/ Krejci is an upgrade over Ritchie/Kase w/ Krejci.
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