Hockey

Game #10 – Kings vs. Hawks Preview – Shadows Of The Empire

By Matt McClure 1215 0

vs

Game Time: 6:00PM CDT
TV/Radio: NBC Sports Chicago, WGN-AM 720
Keep Pretending Drew Doughty Isn’t A Rapist: Jewels From The Crown

One thing about hockey’s often asinine scheduling that can be construed as a positive is that teams rarely have to marinate longer than 48 hours on bad losses, even if it comes at the expense of both sides playing their third in 4 nights having both played on the road yesterday, as is the case tonight on West Madison with the visiting Kings. And it’s a pretty clear sign that both teams suck when they are each looking across the bench and seeing an opportunity to get on track.

Hockey

Game #10 – Kings vs. Hawks: Hedley Lamarr’s Buggerers, Bushwhacks, and Hornswogglers

By Sam Fels 959 0

Drew Doughty – It won’t be long now before this turns into the worst contract in the league. Doughty is already on the decline and no longer carries the play the way he used to, nor does he really much care to, and he’ll make $11M until the planet collapses in on itself. For some reason, the Canadian media is desperate to turn his “rivalry” with whatever garbage Tkachuk boy it is up in Calgary into Hagler-Hearns. But these are two players the hockey world has already declared they don’t care much about on two teams they definitely don’t care about, as one is just an entitled rich kid who’ll manage the same empty trophy case his pappy did and the other is a rapist. Doughty might even get to Seabrook-sized soon. At least you’ll have someone to laugh at.

Kyle Clifford – Perhaps no better example of how the Kings learned all the wrong lessons from their last Cup. Clifford has always been a fourth-liner who should have been discarded for a younger model years ago. But because the Kings still believe their stinky breath was the reason they won, he’s been given something of a cult hero status even though he’s slow and his hands are made of gravel. He’s if Andrew Shaw was carrying around a 50 lb weight belt and had his hands cut off.

Ilya Kovalchuk – Man he’s good at cashing a check, though.

Hockey

Game #10 – Kings vs. Hawks: Lineups & How They Were Built

By Sam Fels 948 0

Kings

Notes: Quick played in last night’s loss to the Wild, and was terrible, so the Hawks will get Campbell tonight…The Kings have given up 10 in their last two so you’d think if the Hawks were every going to break their offensive slump…McLellan does have them playing up-tempo, as you can see by their metrics…The record might be bad but the Kings have been spiky, pouring over 30 shots in all 11 of their games. And they’ve only given up over 30 four times…

Hawks

Notes: We imagine it’ll be the same lineup tonight with only Lehner coming into the crease. If there’s any change it’ll see Dennis Gilbert slotting in for Koekkoek or Gustafsson. The real upset would be if it were for Seabrook, but a change like that is going to happen after a practice or a morning skate…The lines are closer to making sense but Colliton is still under the impression Toews wants to create space instead of play in it, which just isn’t true… We’re thinking Caggiula comes back in, as he didn’t really do anything to be scratched, but again, with no morning skate we’ll find out with you all…

Hockey

Game #9 – Hawks 0, Hurricanes 4: Ok, Here’s What I Think Happened…

By Sam Fels 1972 0

Box Score

Natural Stat Trick

Shift Charts

 

Well, it was better? I’m not sure what else to say. If effort was indeed the problem on Thursday, and you won’t convince me that’s the only answer, the effort was better here. But teams that bitch about effort, and then think effort will cure all, simply don’t have enough talent. Look across the ice. The Hurricanes were barely out of second gear all afternoon, and they were never threatened. They never looked like this game would be a contest for them. The Hawks did work hard, and did about everything they could. They didn’t score.

Usually in these recaps, I would point to the possession-share and point out the Hawks had the better of it. Or that the second period was pretty good, as they controlled the play pretty well. But we are in an age now where we’re moving beyond that, and we now know that the Hawks’ possession wasn’t worth shit. They didn’t create many chances, and even with limited time the Canes created better ones, hence their advantage in the expected goals count and of course, the real goals.

The Hawks just don’t have enough dash. We haven’t even gotten to the defensive problems, but at the other end, who really is going to conjure something? Especially with DeBrincat fighting it and Kane not at his best either. Saad and Kampf and Dach are doing their best, but one’s a second line winger at best, one’s a checking center, and one’s barely beyond puberty in his fourth NHL game.

Anyway, there’s more I want to get to so let’s get to the bullets, shall we?

The Two Obs

-Let’s start here: Can anyone tell me what in the ever living fuck this means?

And credit to Ben Pope for the long-forgotten art of a follow-up question.

It seems odd that after he made a special point of ranting after Thursday’s loss that the line combos weren’t to blame, he immediately switched them. Did the players ask for this? Did he not believe his own words? I don’t know, but the whole thing smacks of someone who is out of answers. If he had them in the first place.

-And while the combos were better and the top six really has needed Brandon Saad (and really Kubalik too) to start to open space for people, that doesn’t mean they were perfect. Then again, with this roster, there probably isn’t a perfect set-up. What I do know is that Dylan Strome has done nothing to deserve being demoted to a fourth-line winger, and the Hawks offensive woes aren’t going to be solved like that. That’s not why the Hawks lost, and it borders on minor, but it’s still weird.

-And none of this matters, because Brent Seabrook was on the ice for all four goals, and you could argue he was responsible for three of them. No, he didn’t take the penalties. But on the first goal, yes Maatta is in the way too (and that honeymoon is over), Seabrook comes out past the circles. That’s needless. But he then lets Svechnikov find a lane that’s the opposite one from where Crow was looking, leaving the shortside all the way open and one a sniper like Svechnikov isn’t going to miss. It’s dogshit defending.

The second goal was the same goddamn thing. Yes, he was tired after an extended shift after losing his stick. Yes, Maatta should have never passed him the puck to start the scramble. But again, Crow is covering the far side of the net because from his view, Seabrook is in the lane anywhere else. A simple move fakes Seabrook out of most of his gear, now the whole thing is open, and Crow has to slide to cover the shortside quickly that he thought was covered. Niederreiter isn’t going to miss that either.

The fourth one, well he simply loses a battle behind the net to Aho, who either batted Seabrook’s stick so that he ended up making a perfect centering pass to Svechnikov again, or Seabrook did it under pressure, Either way, it’s not strong enough.

The third goal is Maatta, who goes chasing out to the corner on the kill and leaving that passing lane open for Staal to charge through.

Brent Seabrook is not an NHL player anymore. Olli Maatta is no more than a third-pairing d-man, and I question that as the Penguins just made a get-the-fuck-off-my-roster trade of Erik Gudbranson, whom they played ahead of Maatta last year. We’ll call this season a win if the Hawks realize this by the end of it.

-Speaking of defending, here’s another thread for you…

This happens every game. The Hawks aren’t always punished for it. I don’t know if the message is getting through or the players are just ignoring it, but it’s not good enough.

-Let’s do some pluses before we move on with our Saturdays. Kirby Dach was very effective, though it’s still bewildering how he doesn’t get a look on the 2nd power play unit. Unlike most of his teammates, Dach seems to get that the game is about taking the puck and getting up the ice as soon as possible. He’s not afraid to carry into and through the neutral zone and make a man miss to open up things. At least in the first half of the game, he made an effective play pretty much every shift.

The only debate about whether he should stay has to do with what the Hawks actually think this season is about, not what they’re telling you it’s about. If it’s just about him, it’s clear he’s good enough to develop here.

-Alex Nylander also was very straight-lined today, which is good. The Hawks need more of it.

I don’t know how it gets better. It might not.

Onwards…

 

Hockey

Game #9 – Hawks vs. Hurricanes Preview: Working For The Weekend?

By Sam Fels 1613 0

vs.

RECORDS: Hawks 2-4-2   6-3-1

PUCK DROP: 12pm

TV: NBCSN Chicago

HE HIT THE FUCKIN’ BULL: Canes Country

Well now that the coach has laid down the gauntlet, how will his players respond? That’s the question facing the Hawks this weekend, as they face their first back-to-back of the year. They could have picked better opponents than the Carolina Hurricanes. You’ll recall that Jeremy Colliton‘s first game was against the Canes. It was 4-0 after one period. Colliton appears to be trying to reset his team’s focus. Here come the Canes again…falling on our head like a memory…

We’ll start with the Hawks, who were called out by their coach after their totally limp-dick performance against the Flyers. That saw them get one shot in the second period (but man what a shot it was!). The Hawks never created much outside Saad’s goal, and though they didn’t give up an avalanche of shots or chances, they gave away something like 143 odd-man rushes with shoddy puck management and some wayward positioning. It was ugly, and not the kind of thing the Hawks wanted to cap off their homestand with.

And the problem here is they only got one regulation win in seven games at home. That’s simply not good enough. They can argue hey were unlucky against the Caps and especially the Knights, but at the end of the day it’s about the points you got and the ones you didn’t. And the Hawks didn’t get enough of them, and now they’ll face eight of the next 12 on the road.

The most likely scenario here is the Hawks will look to have a little more verve this weekend, but that could just as easily be professional pride as much as responding to their coach whom they have debatable respect for. The real fear is that after going to the “Air Them Out In The Press” lever, what if the Hawks don’t respond at all? Well, there wouldn’t be anywhere left to go for coach Kelvin Gemstone, would there?

Because Colliton made it clear he didn’t think there was a problem with the lines, we can expect the same look to start, along with Corey Crawford in net. That doesn’t mean the lines will finish that way, because quite simply the top two lines haven’t produced enough. In the third period on Thursday we saw Brandon Saad and Dominik Kubalik shifted up to try and give both the top six lines a forecheck and puck-winner. It had some effect but not total.

One change you might see is Erik Gustafsson‘s ass seated in the pressbox for Dennis Gilbert. Gustafsson not only has been awful all season, but he’s a low-hanging target for the coach who can make an example of him without angering anyone on the team who really matters. But he might give Gus a chance to come good after a public peepee slapping.

To the Canes, who have hit something of a skid. They started the year with five straight wins, though only two were in regulation. But they’ve lost four of their last five, including to the Jackets twice and the Ducks once. Some of that is goaltending, as Petr Mrazek hasn’t given them too many saves and James Reimer has been ok.

System-wise, this is still the possession and metric monster it’s been for years, ranking second in the first category and on top in the second. You would have thought losing Justin Faulk would have harmed their possession ways, but Dougie Hamilton has been on one and Brett Pesce has used the free safety of Joel Edmundson to really accent his transition game. The Canes have been using seven D of late, with Jake Gardiner rotating in with Haydn Fleury and his missing letter along with TVR. Whoever they toss out there in the back has some serious get up and go, as they always have.

Sebastien Aho might be their only true top-liner, but as you know by now there’s a fleet of nifty, fast forwards here who don’t need a map in either end. Erik Haula has really taken to Carolina’s ways and has seven goals already. Teuvo Teravainen and Jordan Staal have been doing the same things as Kampf and Saad here, barely getting any offensive zone starts hut having metrics in the 60% range. They play fast and smart… all the things the Hawks can’t do.

The kind of effort the Hawks put forth against the Knights is going to be needed here. Which means short shifts, and your ass hair on fire when you’re on the ice. The Hawks have to be smart with the puck, which means getting it up and out of the zone as quickly as possible. Any dawdling or considering options is going to see the puck-carrier swallowed up by the quick and irritating forwards. Move it forward and move it quick.

Jeremy Colliton has played the biggest card he’s got. Let’s see if it wins him the hand.

 

Hockey

Game #9 – Hawks vs. Hurricanes Spotlight: The Perfect Cane

By Sam Fels 1282 0

If you’ve been following the NHL closely for the past few years, and especially the analytics of the league, you’ve known that the Carolina Hurricanes have been at the front of most of the rankings for a while. They’ve been a great possession team since Bill Peters took over as coach, and that hasn’t stopped under Rod Brind’Amour. They’ve been one of the better expected-goal teams too through that time. They just couldn’t get the results to match, because A. they didn’t have any goaltending whatsoever as Scott Darling flamed out and B. they didn’t have a lot of finish. So while they may never give up any chances and get a lot, at the end of the day you still have to make all that count. The Canes didn’t have the sharp end of the stick at either point.

But if you were to design what a perfect Cane player would look like, you’d come up with a fast forward with good hands who was busy at both ends of the ice. They would be smart and under-appreciated by their own team, not realizing all the good work they did and only noticing the neanderthal, outdated things they didn’t that said dunderheaded organization was fixated on.

We give you Nino Neiderreiter an the Minnesota Wild.

For years, Nino has been an analytic darling, and a darling of this blog. He has routinely put up Corsi-shares in the 55% range, and was routinely around five or more points higher than his teammates in attempts-share or expected goals. Nino simply always had the puck in the right end of the ice, and when there he was creating chances better than whatever the opposition could come up with.

And yet Mike Yeo hated him because…well, we don’t know. Didn’t hit or something? Bruce Boudreau only had marginally more use for him, even though he seemed to be perfectly suited for Gabby’s ways.

Nino has never been a prolific scorer, maxing out at 25 two years ago but consistently putting up 20-25 goals. You don’t find those kinds of players just hanging out in the drug store parking lot. Nino was bugged early last year by some rotten luck where he couldn’t get anything to go in. That was the last straw for the Wild, who moved him to Carolina before the deadline for clinically dead Victor Rask. It was a lopsided trade to anyone who was paying attention, which definitely wasn’t Chuck Fletcher in the GM chair.

You can guess where it went from there…he definitely fixed the cable.

Nino popped off for 30 points in 36 games in Raleigh, playing for a coach and team that knew exactly what they had. His attempts per game went up nearly 50%. His expected goals per game doubled. Along with that his shooting-percentage went up 50% as well with the better chances he was getting. That might have something to do with Brind’Amour immediately realizing his skill-set belonged with Sebastien Aho instead of some plug on Minny’s third line. The results are the results. It’s what Nino has always been capable of.

Something has gone off the boil so far this year. Nino and Aho have not been the dominant force they were, with their combined metrics down a ton. It continues a pattern for Nino, who wasn’t very effective in the playoffs as he was in the regular season, though that might have something to do with shooting just 3.8% in the Canes’ run to the conference final. Still, that line’s possession marks are still exemplary, and it should be expected that Nino’s individual marks will round back to where they were.

And like a lot of Canes, Nino has a perfect contract for them. His $5.25M hit is hardly unjust for a player who does the things that Nino does, and it takes him until he’s 31 when you’d expect him to decline and the Canes to move on. They’ve got the rest of his prime years.

It’s the kind of shrewd move that the Canes always seem to make to now be competitive with a limited budget (which could be self-imposed or not). Erik Haula is another one, and he’s got seven goals as he also fits perfectly into what the Canes do. Must be nice.