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Originally Posted by IliketoPuck
That's a fascinating article, sir. Thank you for taking the time to put it together. It puts numbers to what my eyes have seen this season.
I've been wondering why GG hasn't been pushing the minutes up for our top guys all year.
Look at what Edmonton has done with McDavid. He gets an absurd amount of ice time, and it has translated into the Oilers getting into the playoffs.
If the Flames want to be successful this offseason, they need to significantly dial back the 3rd/4th lines + 3rd pairings minutes to take advantage of our top guys abilities to tilt the ice.
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I wonder if this is a "long-run" approach to time management with the intent to ultimately pay dividends in the playoffs. My expectation is that with the ridiculous number of shifts and minutes McDavid plays he is most liable to get worn out sooner than later. This is essentially what we saw in the first few years that the Capitals with Ovechkin experienced in the playoffs—he would often be on the ice for over a minute at a time, and it didn't take long at all for the other team to anticipate that and exploit his fatigue.
My hope is that Gulutzan's management of ice time all season has occurred with the expectation that the Flames top players will be less prone to the fatigue that inevitably mounts in the post season, and increases with each passing round.