A win today will keep them in reasonable striking distance with a few days to right the ship under Sutter, so here's hoping.
Personally, the Tkachuk-Lindholm pairing is a failure and should be abandoned. Tkachuk is more noticeable and effective plaing with Backlund. I also think that Lindholm is getting a lot of cover for not really being a high end 1C because Monahan still notionally has that title. I prefer the 2 together.
I would like to see them try to give Ryan a bigger role. He's such a good player and he's getting buried in the line up to facilitate Lindholm and Monahan on different lines, which isn't leading to 5v5 production for anyone.
Gaudreau Monahan Lindholm
Tkachuk Backlund Mangiapane
Lucic Ryan Dube
Nordstrom Bennett Ritchie
Leivo is one of the most irritating players that I can remember. Guy skates the puck into traffic, makes bizarre dump ins instead of passing to his skilled linemates, and takes an extra beat to shoot while goalies get set. Drives me crazy.
BSD can really help out a tired team with a great game today.
Last thought... Nestorov over Kylington is bizarre to me. The guy has zero points and is -8 in 19 games. I don't think he ought to be locking down that spot as much as he is.
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