ecolad
Registered User
- Nov 17, 2015
- 1,088
- 1,751
I am pretty sure that Maurice had Perreault and Armia penciled into 3rd line roles going into the season, and then Copp-Lowry-Tanev happened. Their play has been instrumental to the team's success, so it's understandable that he's going with them for now, especially since the top two lines haven't been great defensively. Consider this... on average the Lowry line is giving up 1 even-strength goal against every 11 games played (based on GA/60 and ice-time at even strength). Their GF rate is 3x higher than their GA rate. That is simply outstanding, especially considering that they get a lot of hard match-ups and D zone starts.
I think Maurice could and should pare back on the ice-time for the #1 line, and find a better C for Perreault and Armia so that they can play more of a 3a / 3b sort of role.
The bolded pretty much sums up my thoughts perfectly. A 1-2-3A-3B structure seems to jibe almost perfectly with the roster talent that Chevy has currently assembled . I am one who would ultimately like to see a balanced top 9, with a strong 4th that can match and even outscore, but I think this will evolve over the next year or two as we see what we truly have for both 3rd and 4th line C positions.
Having a very solid 3A line with a heavy bias to defensive hockey (CLT), together with a 3B that more typically is biased towards outscoring(P"X" A) would allow the coaching staff to plan hard line matchups, both home and away, and then actively adjust in-game depending upon the game situation/individual line performance that game/ etc). This type of active in-game management is something that we have not seen much of to date.