Calgarypuck Forums - The Unofficial Calgary Flames Fan Community - View Single Post - The impossible task, coaching and expectations

mikeecho · 03-12-2018, 11:02 PM

Gulutzan and co. seem so committed to the system and their type of game philosophy that there's no room for flexibility.

The PP example is a great one. Cameron always preaching (as noted above) to stick with the system for half the year and things only improved when they made significant lineup changes to it.

The other one for me is the 50/50 hockey concept I've heard Gulutzan and the assistant coaches refer to. Be aggressive on pucks that are clearly yours, retreat on pucks that clearly aren't yours and battle for the ones where you have a 50/50 shot. Not a unique approach at all, but the players (especially early in games when they don't have a good read for the game) seem so wound up about playing the system perfect that they treat 50/50 plays like 30/70 plays and back off way more than they should. For me, all the slow starts and early goals against have nothing to do with being motivated or ready to play. They come from being afraid to make a mistake so they start out very passive, which gets them on their heels defensively and leads to mistake riddled hockey. Once they get behind by a few, they open it up and turn it into 70/30 hockey and start to dominate.

It was pretty telling for me today in his expletive filled rant that he was having to talk about going for it or making a play, almost as if these guys needed to get clarity around what a 50/50 play was.

I'd love to see a game where they came out and played 70/30 hockey right off the opening faceoff, but I don't think Gulutzan would be comfortable with that since it requires being aggressive and taking some risks when you don't necessarily need to.

03-12-2018, 11:02 PM	#69
mikeecho Powerplay Quarterback Join Date: Feb 2011 Exp:	Gulutzan and co. seem so committed to the system and their type of game philosophy that there's no room for flexibility. The PP example is a great one. Cameron always preaching (as noted above) to stick with the system for half the year and things only improved when they made significant lineup changes to it. The other one for me is the 50/50 hockey concept I've heard Gulutzan and the assistant coaches refer to. Be aggressive on pucks that are clearly yours, retreat on pucks that clearly aren't yours and battle for the ones where you have a 50/50 shot. Not a unique approach at all, but the players (especially early in games when they don't have a good read for the game) seem so wound up about playing the system perfect that they treat 50/50 plays like 30/70 plays and back off way more than they should. For me, all the slow starts and early goals against have nothing to do with being motivated or ready to play. They come from being afraid to make a mistake so they start out very passive, which gets them on their heels defensively and leads to mistake riddled hockey. Once they get behind by a few, they open it up and turn it into 70/30 hockey and start to dominate. It was pretty telling for me today in his expletive filled rant that he was having to talk about going for it or making a play, almost as if these guys needed to get clarity around what a 50/50 play was. I'd love to see a game where they came out and played 70/30 hockey right off the opening faceoff, but I don't think Gulutzan would be comfortable with that since it requires being aggressive and taking some risks when you don't necessarily need to.