I honestly think this is part of the growing pains of having a young team. In my opinion the team is playing some of their best hockey of the year as a cohesive unit which is especially noticeable in their transition game and offensive zone time/shots. However, many of the young players that are taking on more responsibility this year (Brodie, Russel, Gaudreau and others) are starting to make 1-2 mental mistakes and it has let some uncertainty drift into their game.
Russel has effectively put a couple of pucks into his own net over the last two weeks costing the team games and you can see the impact on his execution. You can tell that he is thinking too much about the plays he is about to make and it is leading to further mistakes.
Brodie had a couple of bad games (especially against Toronto) and since then what were perfect tape to tape back-handed passes from his off wing have ended up missing by 3-4' throwing off the whole rush. Other teams are also playing him much tougher in the corners now than they were earlier in the year. In the last 3-4 games there were several instances where rather than trying to win the puck from him they push him down in the corner and take the puck that way.
Gaudreau has now had two straight games where one of his plays in the offensive zone has end has ended up in his own net (it will be interesting to see how he responds).
How these players respond and find their game over the next week or so will say a lot about their development. Top teams like Chicago have short term losing streaks also, but they find a way to turn it around. This is the first real adversity that this group of young guys has faced and a big part of the learning process. I am just glad that they are facing this on the back of some very impressive play, a good identity and a late game resilience that hasn't been paralleled by a flames team in many years.
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Go Flames Go
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