Tippet never used time-outs appropriately. Woody has improved that for sure if even imperfect. Line juggling far better/well thought out.
I will point out that split the D pass right after the change happens to every team many times over. I think, that had more to do with timing than, full fledged blown coverage. Its not like either Barrie or Niem has been playing poorly... relatively speaking anyway... so far this year.
A lot of the defensive zone breakdowns are almost Eakins style swarming one side by the forwards up high all going to one side and leaving the other WIIIIIIIIIDE open for a grade AAA chance. Since we didnt see any/little of that last year under Woodcroft one has to think this an execution thing rather than a system thing.
Time will tell of course.
Its not just the D pair. The Center and pressure winger have responsibilities on that play. Both Kane and Drai did not perform them. Kane was not in the prevent lane, was off to the side for some reason (I don't even know why) and Drai had turned around not even expecting possibility of a play. Both forwards should be expecting at least the possibility, neither did.
Teams with good defensive structure cover passing lanes. We don't even do it on set plays off a faceoff. Devils pulled the same play against Calgary. I don't watch them much so I suspect its one of their set plays. We didn't even scout it.
I disagree on when we would be seeing Woodcroft influence. We would be seeing more of that this season because he's had a complete camp and preseason to work on his and Mansons schemes. so that they would be more on display now than when a coach just took over a club midstream.
The common denominator seems to be less difficult practices, less demanding practices and less focus and intensity occuring in games.