[browna]

Said it a few times now in threads the last few days, but I truly think that what is such a big change over last year, and what directly feeds the poor numbers from certainly the top line, and the team results that have followed, is the lack of defenceman jumping up and joining the rush...and the disruption that causes in the opponents defensive structure, that our forwards fed off of last year.

Last year, that X factor of a defensive blue line turnover, and an unexpected rush of a d man, either with the puck or as a trailer late, if not creating a direct chance, usually meant the opponents were unorganized defensively for a period of time after, often the rest of that shift. That zone scrambling of the opponent trying to figure out where they had to go, subsequently opened up all sorts of extra zone puck possession through the time and space for the forwards to better operate, and then often dominate the rest of the shif in the opponents zone before the opponent could recover.

I watched for that to happen yesterday, and happened literally only once, in the second period, where JG buttonhooked in the zone on the half boards, and found Andersson wide open joining late on the other side of the ice.

Andersson missed the shot but the Flames forwards got the loose puck, and sure enough, for the next 10 seconds, looked dangerous, because Colorado was still scrambling to regain structure from sorting out the positioning after the Anderson activation and thus our forwards had that extra seconds of space and time to operate with thr puck and get into a good scoring position.

That minuscule extra time and space is what our top forwards need to make a play vs a play dying, and then of course not making those plays, the confidence plummets as well game over game, snowballing the issue.

I will say that teams are now expecting the offensive zone pinches from our D more, which also contributed to extra zone possession for our forwards last year. I assume they are also doing something to counteract our defenceman jumping up, or our D just doesn’t have the confidence they did last year to take the risk and jump up. However, when they did, it lead to chaos for the opponent team, and often, the next time they were organized was when they were taking the face off after a Flames goal.

And that all then snowballs too within a game. The next time in, the opponent may be more aware of that defenceman potentially coming in, and then adjusting the structure or marking coverages appropriately...but that then means backing off our forwards who have the puck a bit, which then gives the Flames that same extra bit of time and space to make a different play then they are forced into (and are making now).

It really is a factor that is missing this year...the players at the back are the same, but the confidence or ability isn’t yet.

It is also really hard to statistically track, because it’s a tactic and strategy to get the defensive zone coverage stretched just enough to allow our skilled forwards time to make a different play on the puck. That time leads to opening up better passing plays and the ability to take better shots, which results in more goals, which results in playing with more leads and which results in dictating the play and forcing the opponent to change their system to both prevent similar scoring chances from the Flames, let alone catch up in the game themselves, which leads to further Flames team confidence and swagger, and how and why they looked so dominant last year by the end of 3 periods.