I’m indifferent with Eakins. He has not had much of a line up to work with, and the PP which has literally gotten worse, is not really on him. My only concern is his defensive system and the players still continue to struggle with it. If we weren’t always pinned in our zone, may be scoring more.
Last night some bad turnovers from being pressured, but when you play a team like Chicago can play with fire more. Do that against a top team, that game would have been out of reach by the 2nd period.
It goes to show how bad Chicago is this season. We didn’t play a good game, far from it, yet still managed a win.
Our top-6 last night
Rico (-1) - Z (-23) - Strome (-23)
Vatrano (-20) - McTavish (-12) - Jones (-13)
We have three youths in Z, McTaivsh, and Jones. Two new guys in Strome and Vatrano. Then the old, wily vet in Rico. We've all witnessed Z needing a lot work on his defensive play, but I'm lost with Strome and Vatrano. I get that youth takes a long time to develop game away from the puck, Getzlaf stated that even superstar players take years to develop their off-the-puck game. That's why I'm more disappointed in Strome and Vatrano. Two night's ago, Gibby even directed to watch his backside, but Strome remained puck focused than man focused.
Our bottom-6 just play a simple game, this includes McTavish and Jones when they were considered our 3rd and 4th lines. We can all hear Hazy say often that the forwards need to help their defense, but often it feels like the same players are on the ice when that happens.
As a development coach, I'm okay with Eakins. All I do know is that if given proper talent, Eakins proved he can win. That's the problem with the Ducks, we just don't possess enough talent in the NHL and AHL levels. Can another coach do better? Maybe, but everything is still dependent on talent on-hand. Youths Steel, Milano, and Mahura appear to thrive with their new teams. Did Eakins help pave their improvement? Probably.
We only traded four players at last year's TDL, but our outcome dropped like Wiley Coyote off a cliff in every show. I don't think we realize just how much talent we have been lacking. In our COVID season, Lindholm played in only 18 games to start the season. We looked terrible for the rest of the season.
Ducks 2020-21 | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
---|
Subject | Games | W | L | OTL | Pts | . | GF | GA | GD | . | GF/GP | GA/GP | Diff |
Total | | | | | | . | | | | | | | |
w/ Lindholm | | | | | | . | | | | | | | |
w/o Lindholm | | | | | | . | | | | | | | |
There's a significant difference with and without Lindholm in the lineup. Now, let's look at the past three seasons, using the first 33 games of the season with everyone healthy.
Ducks 3-years | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
---|
Subject | Games | W | L | OTL | Pts | . | GF | GA | GD | . | GF/GP | GA/GP | Diff |
2020-21 (COVID) | 56 | 17 | 30 | 9 | 43 | . | 126 | 179 | -53 | | 3.82 | 5.42 | -1.61 |
2021-22 (First 33 games) | 33 | 17 | 9 | 7 | 41 | | 104 | 91 | 13 | | 3.15 | 2.76 | 0.39 |
2022-23 | 52 | 17 | 29 | 6 | 40 | . | 130 | 210 | -80 | | 3.94 | 6.36 | -2.42 |
In the first 33 games of 2021-22, everyone is healthy and the youths showed up early in Terry, Z, Lundestrom, and Drysdale. We just don't have enough defensive talent if one of Lindholm, Manson, or Fowler go down to injury to sustain a high play rate.
We maybe years away from a good defense, it doesn't matter who the coach is.