Quote:
Originally Posted by Kovaz
If you have to be a "forward like Gaudreau" to create offense in our system, that's exactly the problem. Vegas skates hard, sure, but the way they play generates so much more speed than we do. As soon as they get the puck they've got at least 2 players making a beeline down the ice, and the puck is getting fired up there with them immediately. Meanwhile we're reversing the puck behind our own net 5 times until the other team makes a line change.
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What exactly is the way we play? Can anyone tell me the biggest difference between all the teams in the playoffs and us? It's not like we're curling out there while everyone is playing hockey. Last I checked, all teams try to deny entry at the blue line in some way or another, last I checked all teams deploy some form of a forecheck, last I checked all teams play man to man on defense rather than zone and last I checked, every team wants to score goals. All teams play very similar brands of hockey today. It's a copy cat league and everyone follows the ways of the winners.
The biggest variable is the speed in which you are able to do all these things. If you can gain even the slightest advantage, you have a much higher chance of winning. For example, I remember in the 1st period yesterday, a Vegas skater tracked a Flames puck carrier down who entered the zone and then stick lifted and stripped him, turnover ensued and Vegas went on to score 15 seconds right after. It'd bee nice if we had some quicker forwards who could defend like that. But nope, we zero burners on our team. Gaudreau is one of the few guys quick enough to track guys down and stick lift, but he's usually the last one out of the offensize zone.
Lastly, when I say a player like Gaudreau. I'm not saying we need another top 5 scoring forward, what I'm saying is we need a speedy player with some actual playmaking skills and the ability to create his own shot. How many players on this team have the ability to do that? Monahan barely has the ability to create his own shot, he and even Ferland usually rely on Gaudreau to create the play and to find them open for a shot. If say we had drafted Nikolai Ehlers or William Nylander instead of Sam Bennett, we'd have that player.