Hockey is a goal-scoring game, and in the NHL world, the scoring responsibility usually falls to the star players who enjoy the highest salaries. Teams rise and fall with these few individuals.
It worked in Nashville last season. Only Roman Josi, Filip Forsberg and Matt Duchene scored more than 100 goals and 260 power points. And the level didn’t drop even behind the trio: Mikael Granlund and Ryan Johansen participated in the talks with a total of 37 goals and 127 points.
Three players averaged more than a point per game, Granlund and Johansen 0.8.
It was still tough, as Nashville reached the playoffs as the last team from the Western Conference.
When the actions of the above-mentioned players are examined in relation to the current season, a completely different tone emanates from the country instrument. Out of the five, no one exceeds the point per match average. While last season Forsberg and Duchene scored 40 goals a man, now they expect less than 30 and less than 20 goals.
Nashville is allowing 2.49 goals per game, fourth fewest in the entire league. The six-game winning streak was snapped early Tuesday morning against Edmonton.
Sports expert Ismo Lehkonen raises three picks from Nashville’s troubles.
1. The tip leaks
The tip is leaking. If last season the combined power statistics of the aforementioned top five was plus 20 hits, now it is a freezing 41 goals. Sixty hits is a huge difference.
One of the reasons for the drop in goal numbers and collective pain can also be found in special situations. The top five orchestrated by Granlund did most of their damage last season with superiority, but now the power is missing.
Nashville has created one more dangerous scoring opportunity per hour of possession this season than last season, but the puck is not going into the net.
At the same time, the dominance percentage has dropped from 24 percent to 14 in one season – dominance is the second weakest in the entire league.
– The same blanks can be seen there as last year, but the opponents have done their job well this season. Then it’s also starting to show that you’re starting to get emotional, and maybe you’re not all that excited all the time, I saw Lehkonen’s line on the spot in Denver during the Nashville weekend.
Top players can’t even survive five-on-five with clean sheets. The developed statistics of the first line occupied by Granlund, Forsberg and Duchene – recently broken – have collapsed in a year. For example, the distribution of the trio’s expected goals is 43 percent with five against five instead of 56 percent last season.
While last season the trio won 57 percent of dangerous scoring positions, this season the number is 40. Last season the trio won their games 5-on-5 35-21, now they have lost it 7-10.
The trend is the same at Granlund on a personal level.
When Granlund has been on the ice, Nashville has lost the game 5-for-5 10-20 and dangerous goal posts by as much as 58 percent. When it comes to goals, goal expectations and goal positions, Granlund is operating with the weakest numbers of his NHL career. No one questions Granlund’s work ethic and soulful playing, but we are allowed to expect better numerical results from him.
Of course, Granlund’s readings show that the chain has played night after night against the opponent’s best. They also show the team’s sharply decreasing shooting power, which can be expected to rise slightly as the season progresses. On the other hand, Granlund and his friends start the game more than six times from ten offensive zones – the game cannot flow from the starts to their own continuously.
– If the frontcourts leak five against five and there is no support from the back, the situation is insurmountable. The opponent has played their top players well throughout the season and some don’t seem to have the nerve to take it.
2. Unbalanced player base
The collective pain of scoring is one of the sorrows of coaching, but probably not the greatest of all. The most worrisome thing in the team’s game is the leakage towards their own goal. The breakdown of discipline can be seen not only with the naked eye, but also from the statistics: last season, the team allowed 9.6 goal chances from the first sector with five against five, now 12.1
On Friday of last week, Winnipeg recorded fifteen goals in the first sector, a third of them against Granlund’s first chain. According to the Natural Stat Trick website, the number of the previous four matches reaches 46.
An imbalance in the player base is also becoming a problem.
Nashville strengthened its offense for this season, among other things With Nino Niederreiterwho is his team’s best scorer with ten goals, but he is the head coach John Hynes haven’t got another percussion weapon behind the point chain. The youngsters who got scared last season are needed in the post-breakthrough team Yakov Trenin mixed Tanner Jeannot.
Nashville desperately needs the contribution of the youngsters who scored a total of 28 hits last season.
– In their identity chain, the boys are playing the big boys’ game, but now it has mainly been seen as silly ice creams. When the top doesn’t deliver and bad ice is taken from the background, it’s an unsustainable equation, says Lehkonen.
– It’s a hard game of intelligence, how to play such a hard game of a chain of three correctly. These boys are good at hurting, but they’re no Corey Perry or Patrick Maroon. It’s a difficult equation when you give pain, but at the same time you are able to hurt the opponent with a result as well.
3. The club management has not been successful
Finally, it is appropriate to think critically about the actions of the club management.
Responsible for the sports side of the team David Poile is a sports legend who has been in his position since the beginning of Nashville’s club history (1998), but the displays from recent years are not particularly good. If the streak of spring 2017 is left out of the Bills, Nashville has won two playoff series in nine years.
And the future doesn’t look particularly bright, as Nashville has underbooked. Not many young people are coming. There are nine players in the current group who are at least 30 years old and Colton Sissons turning thirty next year. Most of the money has been invested in veterans and still Nashville is not a viable Stanley Cup candidate.
If the team has not been successful on the ice, the same can be said about the club management in the office.
– There’s already a backlog when 30 games have been played here. The probability of advancing to the playoffs is around 15 percent. The Colorado game was certainly important for them this weekend, but they were a little tired even in that one, even though the opponent is missing many key players. You can’t talk about Nashville as a champion candidate, says Lehkonen.
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