Quote:
Originally Posted by Itse
I get that, but not really. I mean, they finished miles away from the playoffs, and not just because they melted in the end. They projected to be a below 90-point team well before the halfway mark of the season.
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This. So much this.
Much like last year - and without the excuses for Gaudreau, Monahan and Hamilton - Gulutzan once again failed to have this team prepared to start the season. We put ourselves on the wrong side of the playoff chase right off the bat, and actually spent most of the season as a below average team by record. It took the combination of a seven game winning streak and a Kings' six game losing streak just to pull ourselves back up into the appearance of contending. And, well, that didn't last long at all, did it? Notably, we came out of our five game break once again unprepared to play. And that was all she wrote.
The seven game winning streak is also interesting in that it was just about the only time this year that Gulutzan's system "worked". (Assuming, of course, we still measure success by goals and wins rather than Corsis and Fenwicks). And that was generated by the top line playing crazy well and the goaltending, largely Smith, having its best stretch of the year. Also, we caught several bad teams and a handful of teams looking to get out on their own five day breaks. As a consequence, there really was not a whole lot about that stretch that really points to the system as being the cause of said success. Several of our advanced stats, notably CF%, were actually worse during that stretch than they were outside of it. It was, not coincidentally, one of our better periods of special teams play though.