Why can't this team score in the playoffs?

[y2kcanucks]

AV is doing the best he can. He wants to win as much as anyone. He's just out of ideas and well past his best before date. The system he put in place worked brilliantly in 09-10. Teams have figured it out and he's incapable of adapting.

When I say they need to re-introduce speed into their game, I mean change their approach to counter the strategies employed by the other team that's killing their speed through the neutral zone with numbers.

The easiest fix for that would be to stop waiting for everyone to collect near their blueline before rushing the puck up ice. It's giving the other side way too much time to set up a defensive stand at their blueline, which in turn is resulting in every attack beginning with a dump and chase.

Mix it up. Have the dman rush it up ice once in a while. Use stretch passes. Not the scouted to death bounce pass off the end boards. An actual stretch pass where you hit your forward in full stride.

That being said, they tried to do some of these things early on in the season when they were struggling and it failed because they weren't able to do so and play responsible defensive hockey at the same time. IMO, that again is on coaching and their inability to make it work.



They weren't ready for the intensity of playoff hockey. That's not a motivational thing. It's drills and pace of practice leading up to the playoffs. No need to 'blow up the core' over it.

So you think that the players didn't know how intense the playoffs would be? There's a lot of players on this team that played here in 2011. They should know a lot about what playoff hockey is like. I think you're just absolving the players of a lot of blame here and putting that on the coaching staff. Don't, the coaches have enough blame they deserve for how they mismanage the games. The players deserve a lot of blame too.

 

[Cocoa Crisp]

So you think that the players didn't know how intense the playoffs would be? There's a lot of players on this team that played here in 2011. They should know a lot about what playoff hockey is like. I think you're just absolving the players of a lot of blame here and putting that on the coaching staff. Don't, the coaches have enough blame they deserve for how they mismanage the games. The players deserve a lot of blame too.

I'm not absolving the players. And yes, they understand how intense the playoffs are. But it's not entirely up to them to ramp themselves up to playoff intensity. It's not the sort of thing you just down a bunch of Red Bulls while listening to Megadeth and you just enter the appropriate emotional state. And who knows, maybe they'll play themselves into a playoff pace before it's too late.

There are things the coaching staff can and should to facilitate an elevation in pace of play and physicality during practice for instance. In addition to that, they had no answer to the Shark's defensive coverage for most of the game. Players deserve some blame. Coaching has shown for the past year and a half that it should have been replaced, President's Trophy or no.

 

[y2kcanucks]

I'm not absolving the players. And yes, they understand how intense the playoffs are. But it's not entirely up to them to ramp themselves up to playoff intensity. It's not the sort of thing you just down a bunch of Red Bulls while listening to Megadeth and you just enter the appropriate emotional state. And who knows, maybe they'll play themselves into a playoff pace before it's too late.

There are things the coaching staff can and should to facilitate an elevation in pace of play and physicality during practice for instance. In addition to that, they had no answer to the Shark's defensive coverage for most of the game. Players deserve some blame. Coaching has shown for the past year and a half that it should have been replaced, President's Trophy or no.

While I agree that the coaching staff needs to be replaced, I think you're giving far too little blame to the players. Henrik is a lousy captain if what you say is true. Also the core leadership group of the team needs to be replaced if they still need the coaches to get them up for a playoff game.

 

[Proto]

I think the samples in the playoffs are just too small the draw much from possession stats.

The only real constant in the last few years is that the Canucks' shooting percentage drops through the floor come playoff time. At ES they shot 5.7% in 10-11 and 3.8% in 11-12. Some of that is just due to bad luck, but their shooting percentage has pretty consistently dropped to end the season in each of the last few years. In the last 3 seasons, their ES shooting percentage through the first 3/4 of the year has consistently been around 8.5-9%. In the final 1/4 of the season however, it's dropped all 3 years into the 6.2-6.8% range before falling even further in the playoffs.

Fairly small sample sizes, but it's the 3rd year in a row where we've seen the same thing. For whatever reason the team just hasn't been able to convert on its shots at the end of the season or into the playoffs.

I think unless someone can demonstrate that the Canucks best shooters are seeing a drop in shot-rate relative to the the rest of the team (especially defensemen), then this is nothing more than bad luck/statistical noise.

I suppose there's some possibility that looser officiating standards have an effect on shot quality, but considering nobody has even proven shot quality as a demonstrable thing, I don't think it could be quantified.

What would be interesting is if, say, the Sedins/Burrows/Kesler start shooting less and the defense starts shooting more in the the stretch run/post-season. Then there might be a trend that could be attributed to a change in the offensive dynamic.

 

[dc]

I'm not absolving the players. And yes, they understand how intense the playoffs are. But it's not entirely up to them to ramp themselves up to playoff intensity. It's not the sort of thing you just down a bunch of Red Bulls while listening to Megadeth and you just enter the appropriate emotional state. And who knows, maybe they'll play themselves into a playoff pace before it's too late.

There are things the coaching staff can and should to facilitate an elevation in pace of play and physicality during practice for instance. In addition to that, they had no answer to the Shark's defensive coverage for most of the game. Players deserve some blame. Coaching has shown for the past year and a half that it should have been replaced, President's Trophy or no.

Any player in that room will tell you it's up to themselves to get ramped up. They aren't minor hockey players needing guidance or motivation. The motivation is the Stanley Cup - to be a champion .

Most of the core played all the way to the final game of the NHL season a couple of years ago, they should know how what intensity they need to play with every time they step on the ice. That helps the young guys, and more importantly, it helps the team win.

 

[Barney Gumble]

Any player in that room will tell you it's up to themselves to get ramped up. They aren't minor hockey players needing guidance or motivation. The motivation is the Stanley Cup - to be a champion .

Why have any coach at all behind the bench right now seeing as the team is pretty much playing the same style for the past several years?

That's part of the coaching staff job to get the team ready (note that i said *part*)....

 

[y2kcanucks]

Why have any coach at all behind the bench right now seeing as the team is pretty much playing the same style for the past several years?

That's part of the coaching staff job to get the team ready (note that i said *part*)....

By getting ready that's referring to coming up with a game plan. How you're going to match your lines. What areas of weakness you see in the other team that you need to exploit. It has nothing to do with rah rah this is the playoffs lets go. Obviously you like a coach to have some of that, but if the players can't get up for the games on their own then I question why they are even in the NHL.

 

[MikeK]

By getting ready that's referring to coming up with a game plan. How you're going to match your lines. What areas of weakness you see in the other team that you need to exploit. It has nothing to do with rah rah this is the playoffs lets go. Obviously you like a coach to have some of that, but if the players can't get up for the games on their own then I question why they are even in the NHL.

I really agree with you here. At the very least, why are they on our team? Time to make personnel changes if that's the case.

 

[Proto]

You know things are bad when people start wasting breath on stuff like "heart" and "character". Sounds like a CBC hotstove discussion

 

[doobie604]

I've said it few times, but the team did ramp up the intensity for the playoffs. way more physical than regular season, and looks like they tried to play with urgency but it just didn't work. Its more on the coaching staff to figure out how to counter SJ's game plan because the Sharks are reading our plays and shutting the system down. They forecheck hard with two players because they know our forwards can't support the D because they're waiting at the red line, and their D expects the long passes and either cut it off, or look for the dump. It's frustrating because I don't see the team beating SJ unless the Sharks crap the bed, have the bounce go our way, or the refs helping out. Sometimes I wonder if our coaching staff ever look for weaknesses to exploit or do they just preach their system because it's the best and as long as we follow the system nobody can beat us.

 

[Cocoa Crisp]

I've said it few times, but the team did ramp up the intensity for the playoffs. way more physical than regular season, and looks like they tried to play with urgency but it just didn't work. Its more on the coaching staff to figure out how to counter SJ's game plan because the Sharks are reading our plays and shutting the system down. They forecheck hard with two players because they know our forwards can't support the D because they're waiting at the red line, and their D expects the long passes and either cut it off, or look for the dump. It's frustrating because I don't see the team beating SJ unless the Sharks crap the bed, have the bounce go our way, or the refs helping out. Sometimes I wonder if our coaching staff ever look for weaknesses to exploit or do they just preach their system because it's the best and as long as we follow the system nobody can beat us.

That's exactly what I'm afraid is going on. The on-ice product seems to indicate as much.

 

[GranvilleIsland]

Because Canucks fans can't have nice things.

A shiny silver thing that you receive after 16 wins in the post season to be more specific...

 

[jigsaw99]

Still not a fan of Daniel on the point for the PP. This guy made a career scoring PP goals NOT AT THE POINT!

 

[604]

What I see tonight so far is a San Jose team that is doing the little things right while we don't.

The team that used to do the little things wrong was the Sharks...I think the things they changed with their coaching staff has made a huge difference.

 

[vector209]

Title of this thread should be changed to "Why can't this team score, period?"

 

[vanuck]

While I agree that the coaching staff needs to be replaced, I think you're giving far too little blame to the players. Henrik is a lousy captain if what you say is true. Also the core leadership group of the team needs to be replaced if they still need the coaches to get them up for a playoff game.

I think you're confusing 'motivation' with 'preparation for playoff intensity' here - which was what Cocoa was talking about.

 

[vanuck]

I think unless someone can demonstrate that the Canucks best shooters are seeing a drop in shot-rate relative to the the rest of the team (especially defensemen), then this is nothing more than bad luck/statistical noise.

I suppose there's some possibility that looser officiating standards have an effect on shot quality, but considering nobody has even proven shot quality as a demonstrable thing, I don't think it could be quantified.

What would be interesting is if, say, the Sedins/Burrows/Kesler start shooting less and the defense starts shooting more in the the stretch run/post-season. Then there might be a trend that could be attributed to a change in the offensive dynamic.

I'm not sure you would even need that. If we looked at the Canucks' trend of dropping SH% and compared it to what you can expect from other playoff teams over a 3 year sample (doesnt have to be 2011-13), that might tell us something about whether or not it's just noise.

 

[BoHorvatFan]

We don't go to the traffic areas enough, we play on the outside. Traffic and shots from the shot get you goals in the playoffs not cycling forever, button hooking to the outside all the time and falling.

 

[Jack Tripper]

Still not a fan of Daniel on the point for the PP. This guy made a career scoring PP goals NOT AT THE POINT!

its not rocket science, you get burrows out of there, get kesler in front and sub in garrison for bombs from the point

too little too late and its not like newell brown is going to switch up personnel now

 

[vanuck]

its not rocket science, you get burrows out of there, get kesler in front and sub in garrison for bombs from the point

too little too late and its not like newell brown is going to switch up personnel now

Instead of Burr, I might go with Kassian for the net-front presence. Giving that unit another big-bodied, RH shot with skill opens up another option if they want to try jam plays and also lets you keep the big point shot from Kes back there. Win-win.

Why ZK isn't even on the 2nd unit consistently just boggles the mind.

 

[pahlsson]

Instead of Burr, I might go with Kassian for the net-front presence. Giving that unit another big-bodied, RH shot with skill opens up another option if they want to try jam plays and also lets you keep the big point shot from Kes back there. Win-win.

Why ZK isn't even on the 2nd unit consistently just boggles the mind.

cuz we got PP specialists raymond and hansen on the 2nd unit

 

[Proto]

I'm not sure you would even need that. If we looked at the Canucks' trend of dropping SH% and compared it to what you can expect from other playoff teams over a 3 year sample (doesnt have to be 2011-13), that might tell us something about whether or not it's just noise.

No, it wouldn't. It's not a large enough sample and it makes no intuitive sense. There's a pretty standard shooting percentage you expect to see at even strength. Not all teams revert to a 1.000 PDO team, as obviously an elite team can have better goaltending and perhaps slightly better shooters than league average. Still, you wouldn't expect the Canucks to be an 8-9% ES team in the regular season and become a 5-6% team in the post-season. It just doesn't make sense.

So unless the Canucks better shooters aren't shooting, the shooting % shouldn't change appreciably. Really, unless the Canucks are putting materially less pucks on net, I don't see a reason for the offense to just dry up. Unless someone can show me something that suggests shot quality can be demonstrated...

 

[Proto]

We don't go to the traffic areas enough, we play on the outside. Traffic and shots from the shot get you goals in the playoffs not cycling forever, button hooking to the outside all the time and falling.

Canucks had enough shots last night, and if scoring chances are your thing, they did fine there as well. They just lost.

The only real problem I see is the player utilization right now. The coaching staff have made some questionable choices in terms of ice time, which is disappointing when the team had home ice to drive match-ups.

 

[RoyalRed]

My PP units:

Kassian - H. Sedin - D. Sedin
Kesler - Garrison

Higgins - Roy - Burrows
Edler - Bieksa

 

[David71]

cuz the ****tard a.v is still making them play defensive mode. its quite simple for the guys really. hit the net. take shots. crash. not play around the perimeter.