Another loss to the worst team in The NHL. Really depressing. They'll back into the playoffs, and not have a good feeling about the way they've been playing.
they should have dominated the Ducks and they didn't. That might explain the uneasiness
1st round exit HERE WE COME!
I have absolutely zero heartburn about this loss and I don't see any reason to believe that our level of play in these past 2 games has any bearing on how we will be playing 2 weeks from now.
These are the exact same types of comments we were seeing at the end of March after we dropped 2 games to the Ducks. That was in the middle of our brutal 14 game stretch where we managed 2 wins and were approaching the gauntlet of good teams in April. Since that 14 game stretch, we are 8-3-2 and 7-1-2 vs the other 3 playoff teams. Playing terrible against the bottom feeders didn't translate to getting waxed by the good teams in April like everyone was predicting.
We lost 1 game in regulation to the Ducks this year. So did the Avs, Knights and Wild (who have 2 more games against them still).
All 5 of our wins came in regulation and we lost both games that went to OT/SO. The Avs beat them 4 times in regulation and went 2-1 in OT/SO games. The Knights beat them 5 times in regulation and won both games that went to OT/SO. The Wild have beaten them 5 times in regulation and no games have gone to OT/SO.
So what is the catastrophic issue? The Avs and Knights have been no better vs the Ducks in regulation than we have. The difference is that they have won 3 on 3 while we haven't. There is no 3 on 3 or SO in the playoffs, so I have zero concern about comparative results in those scenarios.
I have been clear that I don't view this team as a Cup contender, but our performance against the Ducks has zero bearing on that opinion. I genuinely don't see any cause for concern over taking "only" 3 of 4 points against the Ducks.
Krug, Dunn, and Tarasenko not playing is much more concerning to me than how the on-ice players fared without them.