It was moreso a team that covered up it's flaws with all-league goaltending and consistent top tier scoring from Kessel/JVR. The systemic failure due to lack of personnel/depth and a bad system to compensate for that was covered up by exceptional play by some of the most important roles on the team.I see this being said a lot by both players and fans:
And I don't like it at all. We were getting badly outplayed pretty much all season long, and were managing to scrape out wins against the odds. It wasn't just a "bad stretch," it was the good luck running out for a fairly bad team. We played without the puck, in our own zone, all season long - if anything we were lucky to do decently for as long as we did without collapsing.
The logic in Kessel's quote is basically saying "we don't need to change, we were a good team last year who just got unlucky! Things will get better by themselves!" In reality, we were a weak team, terrible at puck possession, that needs to make serious changes to be a good playoff team.
It's understandable why Kessel's perspective would be this considering how effective he was at helping the team outscore its problems. If the defence, bottom 6, coaching or management said this I wouldn't be so positive though.