Bob Cole Division Finals: (1) China Dragon vs. (2) Guelph Platers

[Sturminator]

China Dragon


Coach: Art Ross

Johnny Bucyk – Henri Richard (C) – Bernie Geoffrion
Dean Prentice – Gilbert Perreault – Rick Middleton
Craig Ramsay – Pit Lepine – Frank Finnigan
Camille Henry – Thomas Steen – Owen Nolan

Spares: Rick Vaive, Cal Gardner, Ron Stewart

Ivan “Ching†Johnson (A) - Bobby Orr (A)
Jan Suchy – Barry Beck
Bob Armstrong – Red Dutton
Jerry Korab

Roy Worters
Tim Thomas

Power Play 1:

Camille Henry – Gilbert Perreault – Rick Middleton
Bernie Geoffrion - Bobby Orr


Power Play 2:

Johnny Bucyk – Henri Richard – Owen Nolan
Jan Suchy – Barry Beck


PK 1:

Pit Lepine – Craig Ramsay
Ivan “Ching†Johnson - Bobby Orr

PK 2:

Henri Richard – Frank Finnigan
Barry Beck – Red Dutton


vs.


Guelph Platers
1986 Memorial Cup Champions

Home Rink: Guelph Memorial Gardens (1948)
GM: BraveCanadian

Coaches: Pete Green, Ken Hitchcock
Captain: Jarome Iginla
Alternates: Johnny Gottselig, Duncan Keith

Luc Robitaille - Frank Nighbor - Jarome Iginla
Harry Watson-Mickey Mackay-Zigmund Palffy
Johnny Gottselig-Anze Kopitar-Gordie Drillion
Zach Parise-Fred Stanfield-Bruce MacGregor

Duncan Keith-Chris Chelios
Carl Brewer-Art Duncan
Gennady Tsygankov-Rob Ramage

Bernie Parent
Miikka Kiprusoff


Reserves

Troy Murray, Robyn Regehr, Ray Whitney

Powerplay:
PP1: Luc Robitaille-Mickey Mackay-Gordie Drillion-Fred Stanfield-Art Duncan
PP2: Zigmund Palffy-Frank Nighbor-Jarome Iginla-Duncan Keith-Chris Chelios

Penalty Kill:
PK1: Frank Nighbor-Johnny Gottselig-Duncan Keith-Chris Chelios
PK2: Bruce MacGregor-Anze Kopitar-Carl Brewer-Rob Ramage​

Click to read more...

 

[BraveCanadian]

Interesting that you have Henri Richard and we have a bunch of centers who are going to Henri Richard Mr. Bobby Orr this series.

Looking forward to this one...

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Interesting that you have Henri Richard and we have a bunch of centers who are going to Henri Richard Mr. Bobby Orr this series.

Looking forward to this one...

You certainly have the right kind of centers to harrass Orr in transition.

 

[markrander87]

Interesting that you have Henri Richard and we have a bunch of centers who are going to Henri Richard Mr. Bobby Orr this series.

Looking forward to this one...

You certainly have the right kind of centers to harrass Orr in transition.

Easier said then done....

Best of bad luck BC.

It's a shame those Centers are also the primary playmakers on their lines. Not only do they have to try and chase Bobby around but also then be the really only puck carrier on their lines.

Is it just me or do those top 6 wings seem very heavily biased towards goal scoring.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Arent centers usually the prime playmakers of their lines?

 

[Hobnobs]

Easier said then done....

Best of bad luck BC.

It's a shame those Centers are also the primary playmakers on their lines. Not only do they have to try and chase Bobby around but also then be the really only puck carrier on their lines.

Is it just me or do those top 6 wings seem very heavily biased towards goal scoring.

Palffy is a good playmaker, Iginla can also do it on the first line. Both of them were goal heavy when they team sucked because, well, who were the supposed to pass to? Conroy and Travis Green?

 

[Sturminator]

Given their status as two of the era's most prominent hook-checkers, I think it's worth asking the question if Nighbor and MacKay should really be expected to defend Bobby Orr in a way similar to what Henri Richard did. I do not consider those two stylistically similar players to Richard.

This doesn't necessarily mean that Nighbor/MacKay will have any more or less success than Richard had, but I don't think we can just assume that they'll do what Henri did and leave it at that. I think we need to evaluate the matchup on its own merits.

 

[markrander87]

Arent centers usually the prime playmakers of their lines?

Yes, however in Guelphs situation if they are going to be used to hound Orr as well that will obviously detract from their playmaking abilities. Add on top of that the lack of playmaking within the top 6 Wings and this could be an issue.

 

[markrander87]

When 2 out of your first 3 picks are Dmen, one of them being Duncan Keith, the top end offensive ability of your team will suffer.

PP1: Luc Robitaille-Mickey Mackay-Gordie Drillion-Fred Stanfield-Art Duncan

Has to be one of the top 3 weakest first unit PP in this thing.

 

[Johnny Engine]

Palffy is a good playmaker, Iginla can also do it on the first line. Both of them were goal heavy when they team sucked because, well, who were the supposed to pass to? Conroy and Travis Green?

IIRC, Iginla, like a lot of top wingers, was drafted as a versatile centre, which is funny because style-wise, he's pretty much the archetypal right-side winger who you'd never think of putting anywhere else.

 

[BraveCanadian]

It's a shame those Centers are also the primary playmakers on their lines. Not only do they have to try and chase Bobby around but also then be the really only puck carrier on their lines.

Centers are traditionally the playmakers on their lines and guess what.. centers are also generally required to be able to do more than one thing well.. that is why they are centers.

I'm pretty sure they can manage the mental switch to not chase Orr when they have the puck themselves!

And who says we're going to chase in the first place? Forechecking before Orr can get going and having a strong presence in the middle all the time (both center and defense) is the name of our game.

Is it just me or do those top 6 wings seem very heavily biased towards goal scoring.

Of course they are.. they are playing with playmaking centers. That doesn't mean they can't move the puck.

 

[markrander87]

When able to, which line will Guelph use to shut down my first line?

 

[markrander87]

Do I even have to go in to detail on the clear advantage China has for 1st lines and 1st line D Pairings?

 

[BraveCanadian]

Just to put this out there right now:

mark, I'm not going to engage in your debating style of the past few years which seems to consist of a stream of consciousness / red herring generator where you shove all the work on your opponent and bring nothing to the table yourself.

Why don't you compare our first lines and first pairings?

 

[markrander87]

Just to put this out there right now:

mark, I'm not going to engage in your debating style of the past few years which seems to consist of a stream of consciousness / red herring generator where you shove all the work on your opponent and bring nothing to the table yourself.

Why don't you compare our first lines and first pairings?

It's an honest question. Just look at the line/pairing.

 

[Hobnobs]

Just to put this out there right now:

mark, I'm not going to engage in your debating style of the past few years which seems to consist of a stream of consciousness / red herring generator where you shove all the work on your opponent and bring nothing to the table yourself.

Why don't you compare our first lines and first pairings?

I agree with this one.

 

[jarek]

I agree with this one.

I second this.

For starters, mark seems to have this idea that Orr is going to play every single shift in the offensive zone. Unless he plans to give Orr zero defensive zone starts, this is simply not going to happen.

I also agree with BC that his players aren't going to suddenly forget to play offense if they have the puck just because Bobby Orr is on the ice.

 

[markrander87]

I second this.

For starters, mark seems to have this idea that Orr is going to play every single shift in the offensive zone. Unless he plans to give Orr zero defensive zone starts, this is simply not going to happen.

I also agree with BC that his players aren't going to suddenly forget to play offense if they have the puck just because Bobby Orr is on the ice.

... Please direct me to the post in which I said this?

(Mod)

My apologies Jarek, allow me to welcome you to the 2nd round.


RE: BC. Unfortunately due to time work constraints I just don't have the time to dig into as much data and stats (like I use to). As much as I want to I just don't have the same amount of time. If this is my demise so be it.

 

[BraveCanadian]

Top 4
As far as defensemen go, obviously with Orr / Johnson you've got very strong pairing. I don't think ours is outclassed at all.. besides Orr being Orr.

We have a very strong top 4 and I happen to think that our centers along with a skaters like Keith/Brewer defending the side Orr tends to like is about the best you could do against him.

Using the HOH project as shorthand again and penciling Keith in the low range of where I think he belongs (33).. I'll bold Guelph's D.

Name|Placing
Orr|1
Chelios |10
Keith |33
Johnson|37
Brewer |46
Suchy|49

So you have Orr but we're equal (or better) at #2 and #3. I'll let people decide on Duncan / Beck.. I think that depends some on what you're looking for..

 

[BraveCanadian]

Forwards

First Lines

Go with VsX 7 here, bolded are Guelph:

Name|VsX7
Geoffrion|89.9
Bucyk|88.7*
Iginla |86.7
Nighbor |??
Richard|85.2
Robitaille |84.2

We all know Bucyk is boosted somewhat by his late career team and I'm not sure how Nighbor would be estimated, but he'd be pretty good so we can see mark's claim of my team having no offense in comparison to his first line is false.

These guys are fairly clustered together, although he does have the big wildcard offensively on the back end with Orr.


Second Lines

Here is where mark's offensive depth fades away.. Perrault gives him the best player vs. my admittedly mediocre offensive 2nd line.. Watson doesn't register on VsX except for goals.. but we have more coming..

Name|VsX7
Perrault|85.7
Palffy |80.1
MacKay |??
Middleton|74.1
Prentice|67
Watson|goals only

Third Lines

This is where our offensive depth comes into play:

Name|VsX7
Drillon |86.7
Kopitar |76.9
Gottselig |74.8
Lepine|N/A
Ramsay|N/A
Frank Finnigan|NA

Lepine has 3 10ths in goals and Finnigan has a couple top 10s in goals and points.. but they don't have the longevity even with the shorter metric to make the list.



Fourth Lines

None of these guys are going to light it up at the ATD level but you can see our depth continues vs. China Dragon's lack of offensive depth.

Name|VsX7
Parise |70.9
Stanfield |67.8
Henry|67
Nolan|66.6
MacGregor|N/A
Steen|N/A

All in all I think China's small advantage on the first couple of lines is taken back and then some by our 3rd.. the question is how people think Orr will due vs. our team defense and team-wide strategies..


(hopefully I have all these correct I am going cross-eyed looking at these)

 

[markrander87]

An honest question....is Duncan Keiths career value now better the Zdeno Charas?

 

[markrander87]

Wait a second...did BC just do an offensive only comparison between our 3rd lines? .

Obviously my 3rd line will be used as a shutdown line on his line 1.

Also I easily have the best offensive 2nd line player in Perrault, you saved me the effort of looking up the VsX numbers.

Not having a dedicated shutdown line will be a huge disadvantage for Guelph.Who do you plan on using against my top line?

 

[markrander87]

Top 4
As far as defensemen go, obviously with Orr / Johnson you've got very strong pairing. I don't think ours is outclassed at all.. besides Orr being Orr.


So you have Orr but we're equal (or better) at #2 and #3. I'll let people decide on Duncan / Beck.. I think that depends some on what you're looking for..

Forwards



All in all I think China's small advantage on the first couple of lines is taken back and then some by our 3rd.. the question is how people think Orr will due vs. our team defense and team-wide strategies..

I'm just going to reiterate what BC said above....

I have the clear edge in top 4 and the top 2 lines.

Also "Besides Orr being Orr" is a pretty big add on to the end of a sentence.

I don't see the purpose of that 3rd line. Either they get matchup against my top line and poor Gordie Drillon is completely lost. Or as a below average scoring line they end up against my 3rd line and get completely shut down by Ramsey-Lepine-Finnigan.

 

[BraveCanadian]

Wait a second...did BC just do an offensive only comparison between our 3rd lines? .

Obviously my 3rd line will be used as a shutdown line on his line 1.

Good for them.. when you can get the matchup.

However, my 3nd line is actually better offensively than your 2nd line -- that was the point of that comparison. You roll out a black hole offensively to waste minutes and I will just continue to roll out more scoring with a very responsible pivot.

Not having a dedicated shutdown line will be a huge disadvantage for Guelph.Who do you plan on using against my top line?

Old school thinking. I've had dedicated shutdown lines before and basically lost because of it.. most of the time I've gone the other way and this is why:

1) I can easily go power on power with your top line. They are close overall offensively and Nighbor > Richard.

2) all of my lines feature a strong two-way pivot and some offense and we're backed by a strong defense.. so we don't have to worry about matchups as much as most teams.. a dedicated shutdown line works great against one line teams but we aren't. You pretty much are.

I don't see the purpose of that 3rd line. Either they get matchup against my top line and poor Gordie Drillon is completely lost. Or as a below average scoring line they end up against my 3rd line and get completely shut down by Ramsey-Lepine-Finnigan.

Geez that shut down line of yours is going to be playing a lot. Didn't you say they were going to try and get out against my 1st line?

And its pretty funny that you say my 3rd line is a below average scoring line when they are clearly better offensively than your 2nd and you have nothing else on the table for scoring depth.

Oh wait, I think I just found the purpose of my 3rd line again!

You have a strong top end mark but your depth is bad this year.

This is a bad matchup for you because I don't have a stacked top line for you to use your shutdown line against and I have a defense that can rival even one led by Orr.

Good luck.

 

[Johnny Engine]

An honest question....is Duncan Keiths career value now better the Zdeno Charas?

Chara's career value has also increased significantly since the HOH project. Keith doesn't have to be better than him to be higher than Chara was back then.