I just think back to the summer when he signed his 2.1 Million aav contract and then publicly announced he took a discount to win. Made a sacrifice for the team, if you will.
Then I take a look at his numbers and recall the way he played in the season and in the playoffs. Really Ryan. Did you tho?
Caitlyn Clark can take a hit better than you. Those chicks on the Canucks are way smaller than the ones in the WNBA too.
I remember that. Pretty sure Derek Ryan said something similar as well. Utter do-nothings.
Well lads what do we say about this playoffs? What a journey. The emergence of Bouchard and Broberg is special. I was actually impressed with Desharnais' game as well when he was in the lineup, thought he was significantly smarter with the puck than Either of the Nurse-Ceci guys. To me I thought Desharnais would never be an NHLer after how badly he f***ed us in the playoffs last year but I'll eat crow on that one.
Paul Coffey has transformed the D core, begrudgingly. The scene during the conference champions award ceremony said it all. Everyone's smiling and he looks angry, or dialed in, or that he has been there before and simply knows the hard work isn't over. You can tell he brings that to the defensive group as well and keeps them dialed in and confident. The contrast of some of our players with massive grins actually made it seem like they felt they had won the Cup. The interviews etc, everyone looked way too high. There is the common trope about celebrating the semifinal win for the first time leading to a disastrous final etc so we'll see how that plays out.
Hiring ex players in coaching roles doesn't always work out. For example the story of Olli Jokinen in Phoenix with Gretz as the head coach. Gretz stopping line rushes in practice mid rush yelling at Olli Jokinen asking him why he didn't put the puck through someone's stick and no-look backhand pass to the trailer weaving between the two other D. Some insane type of play that only guys like Gretz can pull off and a massive disconnect led to Wayner being a pretty bad coach in a pretty bad environment -- so it's nice to see a legend like Coffey's message getting through to the guys. Wonder what he's doing that Manson wasn't. If I had to guess, demanding our D make plays with the puck and telling them to have the confidence to do so. The difference is night and day. When people try to tell you coaching isn't that important, tell them to take a look at our D.
Hopefully they brought Bourgault, Lavoie, and those young guys in to be a part of the experience. Like Perry and Henrique were saying it took them 12+ years to get back to the finals after their first go arounds, you never know when something like this is going to happen again. Get the young men in there to be in the environment.
Expecting McDavid to show the entire world once and for all he is a top 3 player ever in this series. He has another gear, you could start to see it in the last game of the Dallas series. This is his moment. He must dominate this series if we want a chance at winning and I believe he will. Still hope they would move Hyman off that line but what can you do.
