Has the system really changed? The roster, like every other team, has had some changes. The lines have been juggled. Things aren't working, and mistakes are being made. But Hakstol's system is the same, no?
Last year, we made mistakes. We had mediocre goaltending much of the season and gave up a lot of rushes. But we worked hard. We played fast. The lines had chemistry. We possessed the puck. Won battles. Had crisp passing. All 4 lines were scoring. The defense was scoring. We outscored our breakdowns.
Last year we also had next to no injuries and the only guy missing was Burakovsky and that was after the all-star break.
That shooting percentage last year papered over a lot of cracks on defense and in goal as the Kraken were able to outscore their overall problems.
Once that shooting percentage went down, after the all-star break, the Kraken needed a five game stretch playing Arizona 3x, Vancouver and Chicago to finish the second half of the season with a slightly above NHL .500 mark.
That's why the talk was about us possibly taking a step back this year cause the shooting percentage wasn't sustainable and you also won't have as much luck with injuries as we had last season.
This year you had Tanev missing a month, Burakovsky missing 6-8 weeks and others being out a couple of games.
That leads to lines being juggled in the first place and them being juggled again cause you don't win and want to find something that might work.
Overall this is a "playoff bubble" team and unless the young guys play really well(which they haven't) it's one of the most mediocre rosters that doesn't have much of a margin of error and procuces way too many of them to make up for it.
That's why, instead of last years 100 point team(that had basically everything clicking for them), it's going to be a 70 - 80 point team this season, if at all.
No, I dont think the system has honestly changed much, if at all. The players seem to not be executing it as well as last season?
Forecheck is an obvious one to pick on, as it's an isolated view. It feels like there are a handful (or more) of times each game where I cant tell who is 1F or 2F because they're both engaged in a scrambly chase for the puck? At least once last night, specifically a couple minutes before McDavid's goal, one of the forecheckers was completely flatfooted at a dead stop as the Oilers went D to D.
Hak is presumably drilling into these guys "hey, we dont have the same level of talent as Edmonton or Colorado, so our game needs to be tight as a drum"...and it's just not. At some point that lands on Hak, no?
Well, there's loads of juggling of lines which doesn't help to build any consistancy and also makes it harder to forecheck solid enough like last year.
They're also not getting the results and therefore don't have as much confidence which also doesn't help forechecking and therefore trusting yourself, the system and your linemates.
I'm actually not blaming Hakstol that much for it cause I doubt he's asking different things this season compared to last year.
The one thing I do critcize him for is the fact that he doesn't seem to be able to find a solution to oppenents changing up things in between periods.
The elephant in the room right now is Matty. Nearly a quarter of the way through the season, who would have thought that Bellemare would have the same number of goals as Matty and Eberle combined. Beniers continues to work hard but his plus/minus (-14) is concerning and he seems too often to get manhandled in scrums. He needs to get a lot stronger but that is not going to happen over night.
Yeah, Matty's not having a good start to the year and even that goal he got hasn't really gotten him going.
I've also read that he hardly takes shots which doesn't help as well and yes, he clearly needs to get stronger.
Espeically for a guy who's a 200 feet center that also needs to be solid in his own zone.
Man...I didnt realize that both goalies were below .900
Even more surprised that there are still 10 teams with a lower Sv%, as Seattle is only #22 in the league in that stat.
We're giving up about four goals a game.
Those SV% have been going down since about four games into the season and both goalies having two nice starts to start the year....