Originally Posted by Cali Panthers Fan
A few things to say about last night and the season in general:
-Massive improvement defensively from the first two games. The focus was there most of the time, although there are still some lapses in play. I credit the coaching for turning it around so drastically, as well as a few players getting into regular season mode. They were solid as a team with good support in all areas of the ice.
-Penalty killing has been much, much better this year. I am confident this will no longer be a glaring weakness for the team this year, even though Edmonton capitalized on a couple lapses in the penalty kill.
-Both goaltenders will give us a chance to win every single night. I don't know how many games they will "steal", but they're at least going to give us league average goaltending. As long as the defense plays a decent game and limits the odd-man rushes and breakaways, the goalies will hold their own.
-There is no doubt that our top end players are struggling right now. That being said, the support personnel has largely been good to great, so all we need is for those big guns to start producing some offense and we'll be in good shape. I'm confident it will happen sooner rather than later.
-I actually really like Gulutzan's system and what he's trying to do. Much better possession numbers and clean breakouts/zone entries. What I am seeing so far is a lack of execution from the players, and not much more than that. Old habits are coming up again and again, seeing the players rely on Hartley's style of game when things start to fall apart. Anyone longing for Hartley has to remember how bad the gameplan was last year, and how stubborn he was to make changes to personnel/systems. I'm glad we've moved on to a coach who has a system that will make us competitive in the long term. I think a week of practices in an attempt to perfect the execution of the system will go a long way for this team.
-That being said, OF COURSE this should have been done in the last week of pre-season, so that's on coaching and management equally IMO. It's up to the coaching staff to get this team up to speed ASAP. I've seen improvement game by game, but it hasn't all come together just yet.
-And one more thing, 3 home openers in 4 nights, with travel to and from each venue, will wear down anyone and throw off timing. You could see the Flames were pretty solid in the first 2 periods last night considering they were playing a team on a full week's rest, but by the 3rd they were completely gassed, and that's the only reason the Canucks got back into the game. I'm really not mad about that shift where they were hemmed in and eventually scored on, they were just extremely exhausted.
Anyone deciding that this season is already lost after 3 games is being pretty stupid. Yes, we lost to bad teams in bad ways, but I still see this team as one that can compete for a playoff spot. Probably a bubble team, but right there in that mix at any rate. Give them some time before freaking out. A bad start is less than ideal, but it's nothing we can't recover from.
Don't forget: 3 games add up to 3.7% of the season. There's a LOT more hockey to play.
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