Joined: Nov. 2017
Posts: 3,188
Likes: 2,123
1. First things first, our team is slow. Like really slow. We could use a speedster or 2. I think thats one of the elements I'm most excited for in Reichel. Nylander is fast but he can get a little bit ahead of himself sometimes. Need someone who can use their speed and carry the puck in.
2. 12-17-88 doesnt work. Something just doesnt work between them at 5v5 and its very frustrating. I think we do this by putting the 12-17-65 line back together that looked decent last year and we give Kubalik and Suter a chance to play with Kane and see if that can bring some of the offense out, because I tell ya, Pirri isnt the guy. He's too damn slow. I don't think either line is really ready for 1st line minutes so I would say they both see a decent amount of time, with Kane doing the double shift thing when Shaw starts to be stupid.
3. Our defense wasn't the worst. Boqvist made some mistakes, Z made some mistakes, Mitchell made some mistakes, but as a whole, I felt most of the errors were made by the forwards, which is alarming because we signed a bunch of "defensive forwards." Murphy looked like our best player the whole night. Wallmark and Janmark looked iffy at best and theyre both pretty slow, which never helps. Our 4th line was our best line because they actually looked like they gave a damn, and sure, they gave up some good defensive zone chances, but they had the best offensive chances all night so I'll call it even. I was never the biggest fan of carpenter cuz the dude has bricks for hands, but atleast he makes stuff happen.
4. Subban isn't the answer. He's fine, and he wasn't at fault for half of the goals, but he is out of position a lot and gives up a **** ton of rebounds. He's 27. He isn't gonna get better. Give me delia and Lankinen.
5. Back to the speed point. Put Kurashev in for Wallmark or Janmark. We aren't going to have quality chances if our bottom 6 is made up of plugs. You gotta put some offensive potential in there to make stuff happen. At his worst, I don't think he is worse than what we saw tonight. At best, maybe he shows up and proves himself worthy of the spot. Also, I'd like to see Kalynuk get a rotation in for Zadorov at some point. He probably isn't the answer defensively, but if we aren't going to be able to score a goal, what's the point?
Idk. Game wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Maybe we could take a couple games off of detroit at this rate.