shows all hockey NHL finals as live broadcasts. The Florida Panthers and Vegas Golden Knights will meet on the night between Saturday and Sunday in the fourth final. You can watch the match live on TV2 and Areena from 3:00.
SUNRISE. The pilot of the NHL hockey finalist team, held in connection with Saturday’s morning practice by Paul Maurice the press conference did not have time to expire for a couple of minutes, when it was brought up as a topic of conversation again. Namely, Florida’s captain Alexander Barkov scoring game.
The hockey community on both sides of the ocean seems to be feverishly thinking about why the goal production of a player from Tampere, who profiles as a 40-goal player in the regular season, freezes in the playoffs year after year. And it’s not really true to talk about a small sample.
Barkov has scored only ten hits in 45 playoff games in his career.
Currently, the dry streak is four matches long and the previous nine matches have produced only two goals.
In the opening round of the playoffs, the likable Florida striker found himself in the middle of the hardest criticism of his career both in Finland and in North America. The center forward was criticized not only for the power but also for the lack of the right emotional state or aggressiveness.
Barkov responded to the criticism in the rink. Florida came from a 1-3 deficit to victory against Boston, and not least because he overshadowed the Bruins’ star players in a spectacular way. In the Toronto and Carolina series, Barkov continued to subjugate the opponent’s top players, finding his own strengths along with overall brilliance. There were two hits in both series.
However, in the final matches, the balance looks bluntly zero plus zero, which has raised a familiar topic: why doesn’t Aleksander Barkov score goals in the playoffs?
Is it variance, a fleeting dry spell, or is there something about his play that eats into scoring?
Many species and the next one close to Barkov seem to approach the subject through the same formula.
– “Sasha” doesn’t know how to approach playing through scoring. He approaches it through totality. He has pain with scoring, but he doesn’t worry about it. He takes care of how the team wins, explaining NHL games for Viaplay Antti Mäkinen says.
Along the same lines is the Florida hockey TV face Steve Goldstein.
– For Barkov, in defensive play, a stick placed correctly in the path of a pass is just as high in the value scale as a scored goal.
The race for top players is a zero-sum game
Conscientiousness and responsibility is a great strength for Barkov, who craves perfection as a player, but at the same time a weakness when it comes to his goal-scoring game. Under no circumstances will Barkov seek a goal at the expense of the defensive game. This is a quality that every single coach in the world values.
Indeed, Maurice spoke on Saturday morning about Barkov’s conscientiousness, underpowered playing and comprehensiveness, reminding how there is much more to the Finnish star’s playing than power or the lack thereof.
Conscientiousness and taking care of the whole to a great extent can also be seen in the way Barkov operates in the goal posts. Even in the current series of final matches, there have been situations where the shot does not come from a good place.
If we think about why Barkov’s goal production is decreasing compared to the regular season, the level of the competition should not be forgotten.
– Let’s just look at this spring. He has played Patrice Bergeron, David Krejci, Auston Matthews, Ryan O’Reilly, Sebastian Ahoa and now Jack Eichel against, Goldstein laughs.
– None of these guys have scored goals in two months. The teams do a really good job of taking out the best of the opponent, he continues.
And Barkov doesn’t look for success by stretching exchanges, for example – maybe sometimes he should. In the power game, Barkov rarely lasts more than a minute, which is rare for superstars at this level.
A touch of selfishness
Still, the cold fact is that Barkov, who enjoys an annual salary of ten million, cannot be treated only as a center forward of the brake chain, who plays zero zero against the top chains of the opponent. You can get such players even cheaper.
Barkov is a player who is also expected to have a cold result in those moments when match series are decided, and the final series at hand is no exception to this.
How would the result be then?
– He could be even more selfish. Even in the third final, there were situations where he missed a shot. He should be able to think more selfishly from time to time, but then he wouldn’t be himself. In the playoffs, he seems to approach playing even more conscientiously than usual, Goldstein says.
Finally, Mäkinen turns the discussion about responsibility around.
– Selfishness and a kind of arrogance are also responsible. Conscientiousness and responsibility do not exclude the fact that he needs to shoot more and be more selfish at times.
This is how Aleksander Barkov commented on his own and his team’s mood after the third NHL final game.