The only way I see the Mackinnon line working is if Tanguay gets to coast, while Mack and Skille deal with the hands-on offensive and defensive assignments. Leaving Tangs to get himself in position early on, with the breakout, or a good spot in the ozone where he could pass or even shoot.
With Iginla it'll basically be the same thing. He pinches early on, gets himself in a good spot to shoot, or help out in getting a physical presence for those 2.
We have those 2 for this season and while they're slow, they still do have some qualities that they bring into this team. We might as well use it.
The third I imagine as our shutdown line. Considering we'll be leaving with Landy-Dutch and Mack-Skille with a lot of assignments. They'll most likely make a mistake here and there. And this third line should make things easier for them.
It just doesn't work. The line becomes too disjointed because the old guy has to cheat to keep up or the other guys are thrown off by trying to slow themselves down enough not to leave the old guy behind. One of the great aspects of the winning streak was how much more compact the team played as a unit and a big part of that was matching paces across the lines. Plus the old guys need the lesser minutes that they can play on the third line, it's given Iggy in particular a good bit of pep in his step that just wasn't there earlier in the year when he was forced into the top 6. Leaving him where he is and giving Greg a shot at taking Tanguay's spot on the LW of that line is the way to go and I hope Roy doesn't over-react to this loss and undo one of the best things this winning streak has achieved...putting Iggy on Malkin's wing.
If we change things up I want:
Martinsen* - Soderberg - Duchene
Landeskog - MacKinnon - Comeau*
Tangs/Grigorenko - Malkin - Iginla
Cody - Grigorenko/Wagner - Skille
*try Comeau and Biffkaka with both Landy-MacK and Soda-Matt in practice and see which set of lines seems to fit better
Would let Roy ease 92-29's minutes til they get healthy/found their form and would let them simplify things for a little while on a line that could be really fast and really physical and could score some dirty goals for us. Plus it'd put our two best forwards (atm) together to see if they spark as well as it looked they would earlier in the year when they played together on the PP. Keeps the old guys and Malkin in the bottom 6 while giving a clear avenue for Greg to start getting some looks with some players he can actually feed when he earns a promotion; if he isn't ready to be trusted in the top 6. Just means Tangs either being moved at the TDL or Roy being ready to scratch Tangs after the deadline, at least intermittently, while also leaving him on the 4th line at times...aka the Briere route.
Not that I'm ever happy when a player is hurt but if this is what it takes to get Gormley inserted into the lineup instead of Guenin, so be it.
I'm scared of what all of the minutes Beauch and EJ are going to have to play is going to do too our old LHD's longevity; which was dubious to begin with. Gormley-Redmond are barely going to leave the bench.
