Quote:
Originally Posted by Textcritic
"Too small and soft" are highly impressionable and subjective—especially considering that the slightly smaller and marginally heavier Boston Bruins are presently two wins away from the Stanley Cup. The Flames are not "too slow": there are varieties of reasons why they appeared consistently slower in the playoffs than Colorado, but given how well they played with pace and controlled the puck during the regular season it would seem to me that their post-season failures were most likely psychological than physical. To me, it looked like the Avalanche seized momentum, and the Flames could never wrest it back despite holding leads at late stages in three of the first four games. |
There were only 4 regular Flames skaters under 6 feet last year. Two of them were Ryan and Mangiapane, who aren't soft. Now of the rest, you can say Monahan, Brodie, Janko and often Neal play with little or no edge. Backlund can let that side of things get away. So can Frolik. I don't think a major change is needed to get the edginess level cranked up a bit. We know Neal can be snarlier. And I've seen Backlund play a gritty game.
Maybe Monahan has to be in a fight and not get pummeled. Get his confidence in his size going.