So a few more thoughts TLDR alert
Credit to the Avs for coming out like house on fire and playing so fast all over the ice. They dictated the style of play right off the hop and really for most of the game.
One of the reasons our D looked a bit rattled was that Bones was using that old school Hartley in Calgary break out system where the strong side forward was up around the centre line waiting to receive a stretch pass and tip it in the ozone. The problem was Colorado was overloading the boards on the strong side and tended to have two layers of players between our defender and his target. Combine it with a fast F1 forecheck against and our defenders were getting hung out to dry without a good 1st pass option. It started working a bit better when we targeted the middle of the ice for the tip and abandoned the strong side boards but it created allot of chaos and turnovers with our forwards being on the high side of their man on the post turnover counter attack and creating odd man problems.
The main challenge Stanley had was when Colorado chose to dump it to his side the F1 would be on top of him and Stan would continually choose to ignore the puck and play the body only at the boards during retreat. On most of the occasions he would lose that puck battle and the Lanche would establish possession. The D man needs to get back and get the first touch on the puck with his stick even if he is under duress, or at least get that done most of the time. He was "ok" when he had time and space but that wasn't very often last night. After the Samberg-Stanley FU on the goal against I think Bones lost a bit of confidence in the pair and seemed to really shelter them. We need Samberg to play well in this series and I think he is fully capable of that if he is playing on the left side with more of a puck moving partner. I think Bones thought Stanley's size and physicality would be an asset but he was struggling too much with the speed of the forecheck and for the most part he was losing the puck battles on the boards. No shame in it, the game was fast and furious and it made allot of players look similar. I think playing a guy that is a bit more use to the playoff pressure would help.
Honestly, I didn't think Helly played that badly. The 3rd goal was a howler and that can't happen but other than that it seemed to be screens, tips, bounces, or him getting totally hung out to dry (goal two). Connor was under siege for allot of the game and made lots of really good stops too. Now it saying that "not playing badly" is not going to be good enough, he's going to need to be our best player most nights.
I can also take Colorado to the wood shed too, we got three of our goals on forced turnovers, sloppy defense, blown coverages when they were on a man, screens as well. Sure their goalie played poorly and has to be better but we made them look really bad when we could actually control the play in their zone.
Either way it was one for the ages to be at.............somebody posted this was like that 8-7 game we had with the Flyers lite and that was spot on.
Odd comment alert, one of my favorite Jets last night was Namestnikov, he was playing with allot of confidence and I think he looked really good. Hopefully they can get him a bit more TOI.
Oh and if I didn't mention it watching Nate MacKinnon out there is really something to behold. Too bad its happening against the team I am desperately cheering for.
