Post-Game Talk: 10/28/14 l Avs Lose In SO To Sharks

[Freudian]

Stuart's top end speed and agility are fine... his acceleration is brutal though. As a pure skater... he is probably the 3rd/4th best skater on defense. Wilson, Guenin, Holden, and Hejda (this year's version so far... his skating has slipped) are all worse skaters.

That's why I was ok with the Holden-Redmond pairing. Holden was basically mostly trying to get in the way of people while Redmond fetched pucks.

 

[InjuredChoker]

I think he has been solid since Roy cut down his minutes a bit and I would go as far as saying he has been excellent on the PK. However, his skating? Well below average for me. It's scary whenever he steps up and someone comes at him with speed.

his straight line speed is good. mobility, acceleration and backwards skating, not so.

 

[Avs_19]

Stuart's top end speed and agility are fine... his acceleration is brutal though. As a pure skater... he is probably the 3rd/4th best skater on defense. Wilson, Guenin, Holden, and Hejda (this year's version so far... his skating has slipped) are all worse skaters.

Such an accomplishment! We've got some speed demons back there.

 

[InjuredChoker]

Such an accomplishment! We've got some speed demons back there.

slow and can't move the puck. might have worked in 2004. not 2014.

 

[tigervixxxen]

At least someone agrees with me that MacKinnon should be used more.

http://www.thescore.com/nhl/news/615817

 

[henchman21]

Such an accomplishment! We've got some speed demons back there.

I never said it was a compliment.

When Bigras cracks the lineup, he is going to be a VERY welcome addition. Hell... he would probably be the best skater on defense now.

 

[Avs_19]

At least someone agrees with me that MacKinnon should be used more.

http://www.thescore.com/nhl/news/615817

There's a reason some of the most feared right-handed shooters in hockey - from Alex Ovechkin to Tyler Seguin - occupy a spot at or around the top of the left circle on the power play. Holden's drawing a lot of attention from Maple Leafs penalty-killers in the above cap, but he's barely dangerous. If MacKinnon was in that spot, you'd be cooking with oil.

Evidence suggests that Patrick Roy is something of a tactical genius, but, in MacKinnon, the Avalanche have a killer option that could make their top power-play unit more potent. Instead of using him, it seems like the Avalanche are intent on just banging their heads against the wall.

Thank you.

 

[Foppa2118]

At least someone agrees with me that MacKinnon should be used more.

http://www.thescore.com/nhl/news/615817

I think he should be used more 5 on 5, but I think their PP approach with him makes sense for the time being.

Setting up Mack at the top of the left circle for one timers like OV is something to think about in the future, but they finally have their PP going fairly well right now, I wouldn't mess with it too much.

I think Mack's playmaking from the half boards and down low is a big asset too. They've got Barrie and EJ switching back and forth on the point of one PP, and Holden at the left point of the other.

I think Mack is fine where he's at now. He actually seems to have developed and mimics a lot of what Duchene does on the other side of the ice, from his side. Makes a lot of similar spin moves, and quick moves to the net with the puck.

 

[JLo217]

I got a taste of the Landy-Duchene-ROR potential dominance last night and I want more. I say keep those 3 together.

I'd like to see this line stick together as well. Maybe Tanguay and Iggy can help Mack get going.

 

[tigervixxxen]

My point is mostly about 5v5 too but thought it was interesting there was even an article suggesting he's underutilized.

 

[Freudian]

Roy is in full rainbow and unicorn mode:

"Mike Keane one time said: 'You know what, if you're playing bad, it doesn't mean you have to lose the game. And yesterday was a good example. This is a game we'd like to win 2-1. Varly is allowed to steal a game for us. To us, he's one of the best goaltenders, if not the best, in the game. We have to take advantage of it."

"Right now, because our game management is not quite there, instead of winning 2-1, we're losing 3-2. We have a lot of leads. In almost every game, we were ahead or tied in the third period. We've had plenty of chances."

"What I like right now is, we're in the mixWe think a good objective right now is 96 points, to be in the playoff dance. And right now, we're right there."

"You win two, three, four games in a row and you're back around .600. That should be good. But we need to do that. It's hard to believe today, because there are holes in our game, but it will help us tremendously and I think we're going to win those games."

When you're 28th in the league with a .400 P% you're not "right there".

 

[InjuredChoker]

Roy is in full rainbow and unicorn mode:

"Mike Keane one time said: 'You know what, if you're playing bad, it doesn't mean you have to lose the game. And yesterday was a good example. This is a game we'd like to win 2-1. Varly is allowed to steal a game for us. To us, he's one of the best goaltenders, if not the best, in the game. We have to take advantage of it."

"Right now, because our game management is not quite there, instead of winning 2-1, we're losing 3-2. We have a lot of leads. In almost every game, we were ahead or tied in the third period. We've had plenty of chances."

"What I like right now is, we're in the mixWe think a good objective right now is 96 points, to be in the playoff dance. And right now, we're right there."

"You win two, three, four games in a row and you're back around .600. That should be good. But we need to do that. It's hard to believe today, because there are holes in our game, but it will help us tremendously and I think we're going to win those games."

When you're 28th in the league with a .400 P% you're not "right there".

eerily similar to leafs last year.

hopefully we pick up the pace and make the show instead of leafs looking like lock to make it and then having hilarious collapse.

 

[Foppa2118]

Yea Patty's kinda acting like we don't know they've played more games than most teams. They're dead last in their division and are the only team to have played 10 games.

He needs to dig up another story besides that Mike Keane one too. He recycles his stories a bit too much.

 

[The Mars Volchenkov]

Roy is in full rainbow and unicorn mode:

"Mike Keane one time said: 'You know what, if you're playing bad, it doesn't mean you have to lose the game. And yesterday was a good example. This is a game we'd like to win 2-1. Varly is allowed to steal a game for us. To us, he's one of the best goaltenders, if not the best, in the game. We have to take advantage of it."

"Right now, because our game management is not quite there, instead of winning 2-1, we're losing 3-2. We have a lot of leads. In almost every game, we were ahead or tied in the third period. We've had plenty of chances."

"What I like right now is, we're in the mixWe think a good objective right now is 96 points, to be in the playoff dance. And right now, we're right there."

"You win two, three, four games in a row and you're back around .600. That should be good. But we need to do that. It's hard to believe today, because there are holes in our game, but it will help us tremendously and I think we're going to win those games."

When you're 28th in the league with a .400 P% you're not "right there".

Did you not read the rest of his quotes? He's a positive guy by nature, so he's going to try to spin anything, but there's still the other quotes where he's saying their game management isn't there, that it's hard to believe they can get back around .600 with the way they're playing, and he basically admits they played bad yesterday with the Keane story.

It's not all rainbow and unicorns, but people seem to think he's only saying stuff like that. He's been pretty open admitting that this team is mentally not right and they aren't playing well.

 

[tigervixxxen]

I don't know what else he's supposed to say publicly. Its like people want to get their entertainment out of him ripping the team in public. Its a fine line between giving them a hard time for benefit and destroying their already fragile confidence. They have lost one goal games, they have gone to OT 4/10 times, he is right that they've had the lead in every game after Minnesota. Now I hope they take a nice hard look at the video in their sessions but we don't know how those types of things go.

 

[Freudian]

I don't expect him to throw the team or players under the bus. He never does. I would like him to acknowledge that Avs have put themselves in a hole that might be hard to get out of if the team doesn't change the way they play instead of pretending that they're right in the race.

 

[Colorado Avalanche]

Roy is in full rainbow and unicorn mode:

"Mike Keane one time said: 'You know what, if you're playing bad, it doesn't mean you have to lose the game. And yesterday was a good example. This is a game we'd like to win 2-1. Varly is allowed to steal a game for us. To us, he's one of the best goaltenders, if not the best, in the game. We have to take advantage of it."

"Right now, because our game management is not quite there, instead of winning 2-1, we're losing 3-2. We have a lot of leads. In almost every game, we were ahead or tied in the third period. We've had plenty of chances."

"What I like right now is, we're in the mixWe think a good objective right now is 96 points, to be in the playoff dance. And right now, we're right there."

"You win two, three, four games in a row and you're back around .600. That should be good. But we need to do that. It's hard to believe today, because there are holes in our game, but it will help us tremendously and I think we're going to win those games."

When you're 28th in the league with a .400 P% you're not "right there".

I think he's saying here exactly what most of us are saying: Varly gave us a chance to win, Colorado played a bad game and game management isn't there yet AND we are winning streak away from playoff spot. I don't see how he was overly positive here. I agree with everything he said.

 

[tigervixxxen]

As always, Sadowski believes in posting actual full quotes and not the chopped up crap the DP does. I'm sure it will all be in the presser when its uploaded too.

http://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog/Rick-Sadowski/Roy-Adversity-part-of-process/188/63512

They win 3 games in a row right now they will be back in the race. I don't think it helps anyone to scoreboard watch in October. Its about what they do and not what others do right now. To say publicly that the season is on the verge of slipping away in October isn't going to do anyone any good.

 

[bohlmeister]

As always, Sadowski believes in posting actual full quotes and not the chopped up crap the DP does. I'm sure it will all be in the presser when its uploaded too.

http://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog/Rick-Sadowski/Roy-Adversity-part-of-process/188/63512

Really wish I didn't have to give Eklund hits to read Rick.

 

[Avs_19]

Wins, losses, and points are what matter in the end but right now that isn't even my main concern. The team looks awful way too often. Varly saved our ass plenty last season to get us where we ended up and even though he's playing great, it hasn't been enough this season. Does it really matter if we're leading at some point in the game or if we lose by 1, 3, or 7 when we're clearly being outplayed? Of course it's great to pick up 2 points no matter how the game went but you can only win like that for so long.

Before the season Roy, the players, and fans were saying the team probably won't hit that point total again but they'll be a better team overall. Well, right now they're much worse than they were last season. Roy has been talking about mistakes and "game management" for 10 games now and nothing has changed.

Can't even mock the regression crowd anymore.

 

[InjuredChoker]

"I thought he had a great game yesterday," Roy said. "When we take a scoring chance for and against, he was our best forward. He was plus-4.

nate played well, his best game but i don't think he was on the ice for 4 scoring chances.

or maybe they count power play there too. and then of course. it's no shock that you end up +4 as he doesn't play on the pk. he was probably close to +4 just on that final 4on3.

 

[Foppa2118]

I don't know what else he's supposed to say publicly. Its like people want to get their entertainment out of him ripping the team in public. Its a fine line between giving them a hard time for benefit and destroying their already fragile confidence. They have lost one goal games, they have gone to OT 4/10 times, he is right that they've had the lead in every game after Minnesota. Now I hope they take a nice hard look at the video in their sessions but we don't know how those types of things go.

I think it's the idea that they've been putting in poor performances, save a few periods, for most of the year, and are still doing so, but Patty keeps putting a positive spin on it for his young team, instead of giving off a sense of urgency. It's kinda like when Granato would insult the fanbase by acting like they didn't know the team was playing like crap, and it was a big problem. It's not quite there yet with Patty, but it's getting there.

After a certain point, the idea that "we're in every game" or "we had the lead" or "we played our game in the 3rd period" rings a little hollow when you keeping dropping games and leaving points on the table.

The idea that we're only four points out of a wild card spot is misleading too. We see this every year down the stretch when there's a bunch of teams in the mix for the last spot and are only a few points out, but no one ever really seems to gain ground. All the teams just cannibalize all the points from each other, and no one can jump up the ladder high enough.

They pretty much need to be in a playoff spot by around Thanksgiving or it will be very unlikely they can make it. Sportsnet in an interview with Chiarelli last week mentioned that only 5 teams since 05-06 have made the playoffs who were four points out or more on November 1st. Though I think they meant to say December 1st because they had been talking about American Thanksgiving being the milestone day, but who knows.

A couple teams pulled it off last year, but they have to avoid putting themselves in that position. It's kinda time for some urgency I think. The positive spin doesn't seem to be working, because they still starting games poorly and generally not playing for most of the games.

 

[Avs_19]

nate played well, his best game but i don't think he was on the ice for 4 scoring chances.

or maybe they count power play there too. and then of course. it's no shock that you end up +4 as he doesn't play on the pk. he was probably close to +4 just on that final 4on3.

Hopefully more ice time for him going forward. You don't let Stastny walk, say MacKinnon will take his place as the second line center, and then give him 16 mins/gm. That doesn't make any sense. Maybe if he was a complete liability defensively and costing us games but that hasn't been the case. He actually hasn't been too bad defensively and on faceoffs, it was more in the offensive zone where he was struggling.

 

[The Mars Volchenkov]

As always, Sadowski believes in posting actual full quotes and not the chopped up crap the DP does. I'm sure it will all be in the presser when its uploaded too.

http://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog/Rick-Sadowski/Roy-Adversity-part-of-process/188/63512

They win 3 games in a row right now they will be back in the race. I don't think it helps anyone to scoreboard watch in October. Its about what they do and not what others do right now. To say publicly that the season is on the verge of slipping away in October isn't going to do anyone any good.

Man, doesn't sound like Winchester will play anytime in next few games reading his quotes if he's still having bad days.

Bring back Everberg.

 

[tigervixxxen]

Does it really matter if we're leading at some point in the game or if we lose by 1, 3, or 7 when we're clearly being outplayed

Yes and no, a loss is a loss. But then again not really when you get 1 point from it, so losing by 1 or 7 does matter. Taking OT away from it I think it matters if you are losing close or getting blown out. I do believe this team has the players to win, its about playing better and getting bounces to go a bit different. And that's a tough mix to sort through.