Problems NOT Related to the Roster

Pez68

Registered User
Mar 18, 2010
18,267
25,064
Chicago, IL
I'd like to get some discussion going around the problems with this team, that seem to transcend the obvious holes in the roster. I think pretty much everyone can agree that the roster has issues, and that there are a bunch of holes that need to be filled, that won't be this season. So let's try and keep the bashing of players out of here.

There's a whole bunch of bad happening that should be correctable, in my opinion. The major issues as I see them.
  1. Defensive zone coverage.
  2. Puck support.
  3. Communication.
  4. Situational awareness.
  5. Power play.
  6. Penalty kill.
Defensive zone coverage is awful. It's the same problems we have been seeing with this team for several years now. This team plays defense like a bunch of squirts playing hockey for the first time. Everyone is chasing the puck around in the defensive zone. You sometimes have three Hawk players chasing the puck carrier, leaving the entire middle of the ice open. Some of this is because of issues with the defensemen handling their guys down low, but a lot of this is the forwards having their collective heads shoved up their ass. How many times have we seen wingers down below the hash marks, while the opposing defenseman, or trailing forward, comes right through the top of the circles in the middle of the ice? As a winger, your job is protecting that area above the hash marks.... This has been your responsibility your entire playing career. It's nothing new. This area of the ice is where the majority of the scoring chances are coming from against the Hawks. The wingers have to stop collapsing, and start paying attention to the most dangerous area of the ice. This is not a complex thing to grasp, but requires FOCUS and EFFORT in covering your area of the ice. It also requires ACCOUNTABILITY when you blow your coverage. Great example of this is goal #3 last night. Forsling has his man and is pushing him wide and behind the net. For some reason Toews and Kane chase him too. Kane peels off, but peels off towards the boards, leaving the middle of the ice wide open. Ultimately that is Toews' guy, but both of them botched their responsibility there. Goal #6. WHY IS HAYDEN STANDING TWO FEET FROM CRAWFORD, AS THE RIGHT WING? Hey idiot, your guy is 60 feet away....

Puck support. This is killing the Hawks just as much as D-zone coverage. The strong side of the ice should pretty much always have three players supporting the puck. You see the lack of puck support every shift. The Hawk defenseman gets possession. The winger on his side of the ice is already past the blue line. The weak side winger is somewhere between center ice and the opposing blue line(cherry picking), and the center is way too high in the zone, typically near the Hawk blue line, already too close to the high forechecker. The Hawks have to improve the puck support below the top of the circles in their zone. Stop blowing the zone, support your defenseman, move up ice together, and give the D some options. If you are properly supporting the puck when you get possession, he should have four options... Strong side winger, the centerman, the weak side winger (between YOUR blue line and the center line, not cherry picking past the center line), or skating the puck out of the zone. The majority of teams only forecheck with two players, dropping the third forward in coverage. You support the puck, and you outnumber them.

Communication plays into both problems above. It is obvious the Hawks are not talking out there. D rushes the puck, and forwards don't drop back in coverage. Wingers drop down low to support the D, and the center doesn't rotate high. A defenseman has his guy, and two forwards are, for some reason, chasing the puck carrier as well. Call them off, tell them "MINE". TALK. A lot of this is likely exacerbated by so many new players, but you have to talk. It's not optional in the game of hockey. You don't communicate, you lose.

Situational awareness is something you can certainly work on, but some players just suck at it. A great example was last night in the 4 on 4. Knights have possession in their zone, between the hash marks and blue line. Theodore takes off from the left side...and Rutta has absolutely NO IDEA he has done so. No excuse for that. You have to scan the ice and see what the guys on the OTHER SIDE are doing. Especially a defenseman! When Theodore starts wheeling, you should already be retreating towards your zone.

I'll let someone else comment on the PP and PK.
 

jls24

Registered User
Apr 30, 2013
1,304
1,151
Yeah, the d-zone coverage is atrocious. It seems ingrained in them to collapse down low and consistently lose their guy. Part of me wonders if this is still leftover from Q since it seems to be the vets that are making the mistakes a majority of the time.

They also as a team seem to be way too spread out at all times. Short, crisp passes would do wonders instead of constantly trying to go cross ice or just ring pucks blindly around the boards.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Pez68

LordKOTL

Abuse of Officials
Aug 15, 2014
3,525
768
Pacific NW
There's not enough like for this thread.

Yeah, the 'hawks issues are systemic. It wasn't working under Q and JC hasn't done any better. Team needs a rectal craniectomy.
 

piteus

Registered User
Dec 20, 2015
12,115
3,356
NYC
Is it me or are we just REALLY REALLY slow? Is that a system problem? We're always late to the puck.
 

Pez68

Registered User
Mar 18, 2010
18,267
25,064
Chicago, IL
There's not enough like for this thread.

Yeah, the 'hawks issues are systemic. It wasn't working under Q and JC hasn't done any better. Team needs a rectal craniectomy.

I haven't liked a lot of what I've seen thus far from JC, but we have to keep in mind.....changing these things is going to take time. It was why I wanted Q gone over the summer. They made Colliton's job infinitely more difficult by doing what they did.

JC did seem pretty pissed off after the loss last night, which is good. I don't blame him. I would be all over our peewee team for doing what the Hawks were doing last night. Fundamental. Mistakes. Everywhere.

Very first goal of the game, Keith plays the puck horribly, Forsling comes over to help(the correct play, since he had forward help in the middle), and Fortin loses his man through the middle of the ice. Why? Because, for some reason, he skated towards Forsling and Keith initially, instead of staying in the middle of the ice.
 

Robsker

Registered User
Nov 8, 2014
1,051
205
I'd like to get some discussion going around the problems with this team, that seem to transcend the obvious holes in the roster. I think pretty much everyone can agree that the roster has issues, and that there are a bunch of holes that need to be filled, that won't be this season. So let's try and keep the bashing of players out of here.

There's a whole bunch of bad happening that should be correctable, in my opinion. The major issues as I see them.
  1. Defensive zone coverage.
  2. Puck support.
  3. Communication.
  4. Situational awareness.
  5. Power play.
  6. Penalty kill.
Defensive zone coverage is awful. It's the same problems we have been seeing with this team for several years now. This team plays defense like a bunch of squirts playing hockey for the first time. Everyone is chasing the puck around in the defensive zone. You sometimes have three Hawk players chasing the puck carrier, leaving the entire middle of the ice open. Some of this is because of issues with the defensemen handling their guys down low, but a lot of this is the forwards having their collective heads shoved up their ass. How many times have we seen wingers down below the hash marks, while the opposing defenseman, or trailing forward, comes right through the top of the circles in the middle of the ice? As a winger, your job is protecting that area above the hash marks.... This has been your responsibility your entire playing career. It's nothing new. This area of the ice is where the majority of the scoring chances are coming from against the Hawks. The wingers have to stop collapsing, and start paying attention to the most dangerous area of the ice. This is not a complex thing to grasp, but requires FOCUS and EFFORT in covering your area of the ice. It also requires ACCOUNTABILITY when you blow your coverage. Great example of this is goal #3 last night. Forsling has his man and is pushing him wide and behind the net. For some reason Toews and Kane chase him too. Kane peels off, but peels off towards the boards, leaving the middle of the ice wide open. Ultimately that is Toews' guy, but both of them botched their responsibility there. Goal #6. WHY IS HAYDEN STANDING TWO FEET FROM CRAWFORD, AS THE RIGHT WING? Hey idiot, your guy is 60 feet away....

Puck support. This is killing the Hawks just as much as D-zone coverage. The strong side of the ice should pretty much always have three players supporting the puck. You see the lack of puck support every shift. The Hawk defenseman gets possession. The winger on his side of the ice is already past the blue line. The weak side winger is somewhere between center ice and the opposing blue line(cherry picking), and the center is way too high in the zone, typically near the Hawk blue line, already too close to the high forechecker. The Hawks have to improve the puck support below the top of the circles in their zone. Stop blowing the zone, support your defenseman, move up ice together, and give the D some options. If you are properly supporting the puck when you get possession, he should have four options... Strong side winger, the centerman, the weak side winger (between YOUR blue line and the center line, not cherry picking past the center line), or skating the puck out of the zone. The majority of teams only forecheck with two players, dropping the third forward in coverage. You support the puck, and you outnumber them.

Communication plays into both problems above. It is obvious the Hawks are not talking out there. D rushes the puck, and forwards don't drop back in coverage. Wingers drop down low to support the D, and the center doesn't rotate high. A defenseman has his guy, and two forwards are, for some reason, chasing the puck carrier as well. Call them off, tell them "MINE". TALK. A lot of this is likely exacerbated by so many new players, but you have to talk. It's not optional in the game of hockey. You don't communicate, you lose.

Situational awareness is something you can certainly work on, but some players just suck at it. A great example was last night in the 4 on 4. Knights have possession in their zone, between the hash marks and blue line. Theodore takes off from the left side...and Rutta has absolutely NO IDEA he has done so. No excuse for that. You have to scan the ice and see what the guys on the OTHER SIDE are doing. Especially a defenseman! When Theodore starts wheeling, you should already be retreating towards your zone.

I'll let someone else comment on the PP and PK.

Much of what you say is spot on. Much of what you point out is correctable - theoretically. I can even go so far as to say that I can put my name down as a "like" on your post. At the same time though...

A good subset of the systemic problems you highlight are, in fact, very roster related. Good hockey players communicate. Good hockey players have hockey IQ sufficient to have good "situational awareness." In fact, you posit that FOCUS and EFFORT are key --- and that is absolutely true. That said, good hockey players inherently have good focus and exert good effort.

My point is that this roster --- the composite of the group --- generally does not exert effort, are not overly focused, and - I might add - are not willing to play sacrificially (exert effort to get net-front presence, move others away from in front of our net, move well w/o the puck, battle in the corners, play with grit, sacrifice their bodies with the tenacity it takes to win with a modestly talented team).

My basic point is that these systemic problems are not nearly as disconnected from the personnel on the roster as you suggest. This team does not have enough gritty, intense, hard-working, high work ethic, high intensity players and does not have enough of a sense of urgency to overcome most of these systemic problems. Listen to Toews - he still says we have a great team with amazing talent we just need to tweak a few things. No --- massive change is needed.

Modest movement with this roster towards fixing some of these systemic problems is possible with some proper coaching and a bit of urgency. I expect such. But this roster needs an infusion of new intense, high-energy players to replace some of the loafers that are on team before wholesale improvement can come.
 

Robsker

Registered User
Nov 8, 2014
1,051
205
I haven't liked a lot of what I've seen thus far from JC, but we have to keep in mind.....changing these things is going to take time. It was why I wanted Q gone over the summer. They made Colliton's job infinitely more difficult by doing what they did.

JC did seem pretty pissed off after the loss last night, which is good. I don't blame him. I would be all over our peewee team for doing what the Hawks were doing last night. Fundamental. Mistakes. Everywhere.

Very first goal of the game, Keith plays the puck horribly, Forsling comes over to help(the correct play, since he had forward help in the middle), and Fortin loses his man through the middle of the ice. Why? Because, for some reason, he skated towards Forsling and Keith initially, instead of staying in the middle of the ice.

I too have not been impressed with our new coach. I also agree that it takes time. Culture change can be slow. It is way, way too early to assess JC in any definitive way. That said, what I have seen so far is less than encouraging. That can change though and I both expect and, of course, hope that it will.
 

LordKOTL

Abuse of Officials
Aug 15, 2014
3,525
768
Pacific NW
I haven't liked a lot of what I've seen thus far from JC, but we have to keep in mind.....changing these things is going to take time. It was why I wanted Q gone over the summer. They made Colliton's job infinitely more difficult by doing what they did.

JC did seem pretty pissed off after the loss last night, which is good. I don't blame him. I would be all over our peewee team for doing what the Hawks were doing last night. Fundamental. Mistakes. Everywhere.

Very first goal of the game, Keith plays the puck horribly, Forsling comes over to help(the correct play, since he had forward help in the middle), and Fortin loses his man through the middle of the ice. Why? Because, for some reason, he skated towards Forsling and Keith initially, instead of staying in the middle of the ice.

You're preaching to the choir man :).
 
  • Like
Reactions: LDF

Pez68

Registered User
Mar 18, 2010
18,267
25,064
Chicago, IL
Much of what you say is spot on. Much of what you point out is correctable - theoretically. I can even go so far as to say that I can put my name down as a "like" on your post. At the same time though...

A good subset of the systemic problems you highlight are, in fact, very roster related. Good hockey players communicate. Good hockey players have hockey IQ sufficient to have good "situational awareness." In fact, you posit that FOCUS and EFFORT are key --- and that is absolutely true. That said, good hockey players inherently have good focus and exert good effort.

My point is that this roster --- the composite of the group --- generally does not exert effort, are not overly focused, and - I might add - are not willing to play sacrificially (exert effort to get net-front presence, move others away from in front of our net, move well w/o the puck, battle in the corners, play with grit, sacrifice their bodies with the tenacity it takes to win with a modestly talented team).

My basic point is that these systemic problems are not nearly as disconnected from the personnel on the roster as you suggest. This team does not have enough gritty, intense, hard-working, high work ethic, high intensity players and does not have enough of a sense of urgency to overcome most of these systemic problems. Listen to Toews - he still says we have a great team with amazing talent we just need to tweak a few things. No --- massive change is needed.

Modest movement with this roster towards fixing some of these systemic problems is possible with some proper coaching and a bit of urgency. I expect such. But this roster needs an infusion of new intense, high-energy players to replace some of the loafers that are on team before wholesale improvement can come.

Of course it plays a part. The thing is though, it isn't the new guys making these mistakes most nights. The Vegas game is a great example.

Goal #1. The first domino is Keith badly misplaying the puck. Which causes Forsling to come over to prevent a breakaway. Which then causes Fortin to have to cover for Forsling. Yeah, it was Fortin who blew that coverage, but Keith started the whole thing.

Goal #2, Toews passes the puck to where a defenseman should be. He isn't, and I have no idea how Toews missed that Manning was not there. Yeah, Manning should have been there, but he wasn't. Maybe the D was changing? Then Crawford also passes the puck to nobody. Saad is floating back and for some reason skates away from Tuch. No idea WTF he was doing there. Boom. Fail by 3 players that absolutely know better.

Goal #3. Forsling is playing his man. Toews skates right at the same guy. As does Kane. Kane realizes it but instead of looking to the danger zone to his right, peels to the left. Center of ice wide open. Puck in net. Fail by two veterans.

Goal #4. Toews loses the draw. Kruger stands still. Toews overcommits to the left, leaving Karlsson wide open. Puck in the net again.

Noticing a pattern here?
 

Pez68

Registered User
Mar 18, 2010
18,267
25,064
Chicago, IL
This kind of play is what happens when you leave a coach in place a year and a half after his shelf life has expired... Colliton might not be the answer. The jury is still out on that. But Q, after the Nashville series, was clearly not the answer. Now you allowed the core players to be lazy, complacent, and lack urgency for an entire season... and didn't even have the common sense to give the new coach training camp to try and sort things out with a fresh slate.

Good luck breaking those habits.
 

Robsker

Registered User
Nov 8, 2014
1,051
205
This kind of play is what happens when you leave a coach in place a year and a half after his shelf life has expired... Colliton might not be the answer. The jury is still out on that. But Q, after the Nashville series, was clearly not the answer. Now you allowed the core players to be lazy, complacent, and lack urgency for an entire season... and didn't even have the common sense to give the new coach training camp to try and sort things out with a fresh slate.

Good luck breaking those habits.

This may just be the best post I have seen at a year or so. You are absolutely correct. So correct that this group of players will likely have to be broken up and many leave to be replaced by others. And, as was stated earlier by others --- guys like Duncs, Keith, Toews and Kane are more the problem than the younger guys --- they set the tone and those guys do not display a whole lot of urgency to get better. Our core players are exactly what you say --- lazy, complacent, and lack urgency --- and I will add this --- unwilling seemingly to change.

I am for an all out rebuild because I do not think this crew will be able to, as you say, "break those habits." I honestly get the sense that these guys are getting rather used to losing.
 

Pez68

Registered User
Mar 18, 2010
18,267
25,064
Chicago, IL
This may just be the best post I have seen at a year or so. You are absolutely correct. So correct that this group of players will likely have to be broken up and many leave to be replaced by others. And, as was stated earlier by others --- guys like Duncs, Keith, Toews and Kane are more the problem than the younger guys --- they set the tone and those guys do not display a whole lot of urgency to get better. Our core players are exactly what you say --- lazy, complacent, and lack urgency --- and I will add this --- unwilling seemingly to change.

I am for an all out rebuild because I do not think this crew will be able to, as you say, "break those habits." I honestly get the sense that these guys are getting rather used to losing.

I wouldn't say that yet. Those guys all have a ton of pride, are competitive, and they are all winners. It's the only way you win three cups. Based on the post-game interviews, I'm not getting that vibe at the moment. They seem to be frustrated, and pissed off. Even Seabrook. Which is good. It's when they stop being frustrated and pissed off I will worry. At that point, you start shipping them out. You realize the problem though, right? If they are complacent, why would they waive their NMC clauses to leave Chicago? They won't.
 
  • Like
Reactions: jls24

BobbyJet

I am Canadian
Oct 27, 2010
29,736
9,838
Dundas, Ontario. Can
I wouldn't say that yet. Those guys all have a ton of pride, are competitive, and they are all winners. It's the only way you win three cups. Based on the post-game interviews, I'm not getting that vibe at the moment. They seem to be frustrated, and pissed off. Even Seabrook. Which is good. It's when they stop being frustrated and pissed off I will worry. At that point, you start shipping them out. You realize the problem though, right? If they are complacent, why would they waive their NMC clauses to leave Chicago? They won't.

You nailed it in post #20. There is no quick fix.
 

Marotte Marauder

Registered User
Aug 10, 2008
8,587
2,442
OP is spot on in identifying the problem(s).

Do you think JC is unable to ID them as well? Do you think JC is unable to communicate the corrections required? Do you think the players (Cup core winners) are too sassy to hear the message? Do you think the players hear the message but are unable to execute?
 

Toews2Bickell

It's Showtime
Nov 24, 2013
23,373
23,282
OP is spot on in identifying the problem(s).

Do you think JC is unable to ID them as well? Do you think JC is unable to communicate the corrections required? Do you think the players (Cup core winners) are too sassy to hear the message? Do you think the players hear the message but are unable to execute?

seems most likely scenario, between the two though i'm not sure, maybe 50/50, core is mailing it in but could execute, depth hears message and is committed but is simply not good enough to execute
 
  • Like
Reactions: Marotte Marauder

Ad

Upcoming events

Ad

Ad

-->