Columbus, currently at the bottom of the NHL, played one of its best games of the season in Washington on Sunday. It drove the home team, who played well in recent weeks, into a corner, but there was no result. Not even for someone who shot at the goal nine times Patrik Lainee.
The final scores were 1–0 for Washington.
Laine was able to score from his “own office” so many times in the third set alone that it is rare for an opponent to survive so many attempts with dry feet.
In the same breath, it can also be stated that Laine’s latest dry season will not surprise. The Tampere-born winger has scored once in his last ten matches. Even before Christmas, Laine’s bat had been hot, hitting seven times in nine matches.
Nothing is more Laine.
Laine started his NHL career in Winnipeg in the fall of 2016 by forging huge numbers of goals, but as his career progressed, playing has become a hot-cold alternation. There has been a lot of talk about Laine’s hot periods, but the pier also has quite a few cold periods under its belt.
In the case of Laine, we often talk about a period of 10–15 matches, during which the goal taps are almost completely exhausted and the same washing water goes with intact overall playing.
Urheilu’s ice hockey expert Ismo Lehkonen and American media The Athletic following Columbus on a daily basis Aaron Portzline pondered the reasons why Laine scores a large part of his goals during hot streaks, and on the other hand, why Columbus is unable to utilize Laine’s special skills in their dominance game.
Cold seasons eat away at a man, because Laine lives on paint
It is undeniable that Patrik Laine has come a long way from a potential 50 or 60 goal player. It is not appropriate to blame Columbus’s weak situation as a club for this. Laine cannot forge results in the NHL at the same pace as the league’s best scorers.
This has been the case for a long time, already in Winnipeg. Laine’s first decent frost pipes were seen in Winnipeg in the 2018-2019 season. He played once in 19 and once in 22 matches, scoring only one goal during the periods. In addition, one period of 13 and one 11 matches was seen, in which he scored two goals.
Laine therefore played 65 matches in the cold periods, scoring six hits in them. On the other hand, 24 goals were scored in the remaining 17 matches.
The following season saw two goalless streaks, one lasting seven and the other ten games. After moving to Columbus, Laine had scoreless streaks of 11 and 14 games and one 11-game streak during which two goals were scored.
There have been 2–3 longer tubes available every year.
– This kind of thing interests me as a coach. Of course, when you think about these numbers, you easily think that he is a flow player. But why is that, Ismo Lehkonen asks.
– I’m starting to wonder if he’s going to get tired when he’s playing every other day in the NHL, Lehkonen continues.
The other side of the conversation is mental variety. Laine is an artist in his player profile, not so much a hard worker. As a goalscorer, the Tappara breed is not a cold, analytical and long-suffering predator, but rather a live in the moment operating with emotion and instincts.
This is emphasized at the ends of the roller coaster: when it’s fun, it’s really fun. If things go smoothly, the body language screams frustration.
– Laine can be hard on herself. If things don’t start going well at the beginning of the match, he might get frustrated and discouraged, which will water down the rest of the evening. When it comes to a few of these games in a row, he’s in a rut that’s hard to get out of, Aaron Portzline sees.
– There are things in him that work against him, Portzline, who writes for The Athletic, continues.
When the paint taps dry, anything goes
Goalless periods are inevitable in the NHL even for the best. A whole other discussion is what, other than goals, a player can bring to the table during the dry season in order for the team to win.
In Laine’s case, the rest of the game has usually stopped quickly after the goal taps have dried up.
For example, in the 2018–2019 season, Laine had 24 hits in the power statistics. 19 of the minuses came during dry pipes. Two years later, during three dry seasons of 36 games in total, 27 goals were scored. Last season, Laine had a minus seven goals, while during two dry spells the balance was nine below zero.
So Laine is not particularly good at playing zero-zero when the sight is a little crooked.
In the last three years, only seven NHL forwards have a lower power rating than Laine (-44). The chapter also shows the state of the team, but the player himself must also have some responsibility for reading.
– I don’t see any reason for this other than the fact that coping is not enough. When a person gets tired, the humor in the game disappears and even the end becomes slower. Then playing becomes a little slower and easier to cheat. The symptoms in gaming point in this direction, Lehkonen states.
It sounds tough, because Laine is one of the second-ranked players in the NHL draft, who scored 44 goals in a season five years ago. Now that I still have a contract guaranteeing an annual income of 8.7 million in my pocket, the level of demands is also on a new level in terms of leadership.
As the team’s second most expensive forward, Laine can’t be the one to leak. The same applies to the group’s most expensive striker, the Yankee star Johnny Gaudreauabout which there is no need to tell the grandchildren very long about the autumn season.
– It is difficult to comment on leadership issues from the outside, but to me, Laine’s leadership shows that she wants to lead more with her exceptional skills than by supporting others or giving fire speeches in the dressing room. Leadership qualities may not be his greatest strength, and Gaudreau is somewhat similar, Portzline says.
How on earth does Patrik Laine not score goals with superiority?
One big mystery surrounding Patrik Laine has to do with Columbus’ dominance game. Laine is not in the flight of previous years as a goalscorer, but as a decisive player in the power game, he offers a threat that only a handful of players in the world are capable of.
How has Columbus been able to take advantage of this? In three seasons, Laine has scored ten power play goals at Ohio State. In Winnipeg, he scored 20 in his best season and 15 in his second best. This season’s balance is one. The reading and performance are ridiculously weak and it is also appropriate for the coaching staff to take responsibility for that.
Before the season, the joint game between Laine and Johnny Gaudreau, who moved from Calgary to Columbus, was eagerly awaited. The end result has been a huge disappointment. The two don’t have any kind of chemistry and nowadays they already play in different chains. The balance of joint superiority play is one scored goal for two men.
– Pretty incredible, isn’t it, Portzline laughs.
– Injuries have taken a big toll on the superior game. Zach Werenski and Adam Boqvist were the number one defenders in the power play, but both are now in the dock. It is easier for Alivoima now to focus on Laine and cover the passing directions for him, and the team’s superiority does not have enough skill and speed to open lines, Portzline adds.
However, injuries only cover this season. It doesn’t explain three seasons of low flying. For example, Finns Eeli Tolvanen has scored only one overtime goal less than Laine in the previous four seasons.
– Is there enough work being done there for the superiority game? The best power forwards in the NHL work incredibly hard to develop it. The roles have been thought out very carefully for everyone. It’s really hard planning. To my own eyes, it seems that Columbus is going pretty organic at the moment, says Lehkonen.
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