Eco- From my POV we were exposed in the Ottawa series and what was exposed was that our CORE offensive leaders just were not good enough period. Stepan, Kreider, JT Miller and co. Our core just could not deliver at all. We had a straight route to the finals going up against a Ottawa with a one legged Karlsson and a worn out Pittsburgh (or maybe not, but...).
These guys get cut a slack because their corsi is OK and others aren’t. But you don’t win a championship with a core that can’t even remotely match what guys like Hoffman and co are doing for your opponent.
And it’s not a one series thing. Just look in the series before that, Rads line was so much better than what our top guys could bring. Radulov.
10 years from now I think we will — laugh — at the notion that our roster should have won multiple cups under AV, when we look back at those rosters.
And this is not in defense of AV, and it’s not in defense of man-man defense that I also have questioned a long time. It’s pros and cons. But it’s pretty typical of Rangerland to just run away with some fictional exaggerated idea where everything should be blamed on one or two guys and or one or two players being the worst ever (not your posts, but in general).